Tory YouGov lead moves up 3 to 13 pc
December 5th, 2009
CON 40%(39)
LAB 27%(29)
LD 18%(19)
OTHERS 15% (13)
Will this ease the jitters in Camp Cameron?
ConservativeHome is reporting the above shares for a YouGov poll for tomorrow’s Sunday Times. The changes shown are with the last survey from the pollster NOT the last one in the Sunday Times.
The shares are a marked change on the 10 percent lead in the Telegraph last Saturday but the changes are all within the margin of error.
Having said that there will be real disappointment within Labour that after the recent improvements they are moving back while the Tories are once again in the 40s.
So much of the mood at the moment and the media narrative is being driven by the polls and this might just calm some of the jitters in the Tory camp.
It’s hard to read to much into it and Brown Central must be hoping for better things after next week’s PBR.
There’s reported to be an ICM poll on the way as well.
UPDATE: But with ICM the Tories are down 2
CON 40% (42)
LAB 29% (29)
LD 19% (19)
OTHERS 13% (10)
The changes here are with the Guardian November poll where the fieldwork was carried out on the same day as the MORI one which had a Tory lead of just 6pc.
Since then no other poll has had figures anywhere near that.
Overall the Tories will be pleased that both polls have them in the 40s with Labour in the 20s.
Mike Smithson
MessageSpace Advertising
first?
first
All within the margin of error. Amazing just how panicked some Tory bloggers were with the polls over the past fortnight. In reality, the lead has probably remained pretty constant throughout.
141.Changes on Sunday Telegraph’s last ICM:
CON: -2
LAB: +4
LIB: -2
CON Majority reduced by 86 seats!!
Not sure how the ST will spin that - but they will.
2. nearly made it
4 - You are sounding very desperate there MacGabble.
I suspect the polls widen be favourable towards the Tories after the PBR as frankly Darling has little that he can do to entice voters via tax giveaways etc.
FPT
Both polls in the same general range, both would give a working Tory majority.
It will be interesting to see the first polls in January when the full impact of the PBR has worked through!
ICM Research interviewed a random sample of 1001 adults aged 18+ by telephone on 2nd-3rd December 2009. Interviews were conducted across the country and the results have been weighted to the profile of all adults.”
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/election-2010/6737808/ICM-poll-puts-Conservatives-back-on-course-for-general-election-majority.html
Changes from the YouGov/Sunday Times poll in December 2008 are
Con -1 Lab -8 Lib-Dem +3
I think we can say its been a bad 12 months for Labour!
That’ll do me
7 Further, once it becomes clear that the PBR will involve cuts, contrary to the PM’s dividing lines, that should also have an effect.
Wow, big type…
Anyway - Two one to City, so many draws on the run and then we beat the favourites!! It’s a funny old world.
7 - I’m also sure there will also be a not insignificant number of people who given some of the recent media spin about “coming out recession” that everything is not too bad with the public finances. Whatever Darling decides to do, go for fantasy figures or is honest, it will shine a spotlight on the disastrous state of the UK PLC books.
ConHome Poll of Polls - after both of tonight’s polls:
Hung parliament - CON short by 2.
http://conservativehome.blogs.com/thetorydiary/2009/12/icm-confirms-trimming-of-tory-lead.html
When is the next pb Angus Reid poll due?
Others up 2, any breakdown? Could it be the SNP taking a bite out of Labour?
As I’ve been predicting the GE result as Tories 38 lab 28 Libdem 20/22 I’m in the ballpark.
Not much like your mates from the Moosejaw Community College reslults Mike!
Hung Parliament on the way.
15 - We heard you the first time MacGabble.
Most interesting thing is Others at 15%. Do we have a breakdown?
ICM figures give Labour seats at 240.
Do we expect the spreads to move?
Equivalent 2008 polls:
ICM
Con 38
Lab 33
LD 19
YouGov
Con 41
Lab 35
LD 15
Equivalent 2007 polls
ICM
Con 39
Lab 34
LD 18
YouGov
Con 43
Lab 31
LD 16
Conservatives about the same but it seems that Labour has suffered a permanent loss of support.
FPT 146 PfP - And IMO Labour is still good value in that market, even after the small adjustment to the odds today. The +15 handicap for Labour is very generous; the chances of the Conservatives being ahead by more than 15 points must be quite low, and whilst the LibDems (+22 handicap) might get within seven points of Labour, it looks more likely that they will be squeezed in national vote terms, even if they do better in their main targets.
Give it a rest, gabs you have been talking shite all day. Go and find a useful link or something.
I felt sure ICM would have the Conservatives under 40% this month (of course we’ve still got the Guardian/ICM poll to come) so this is quite shocking.
Also surprised that YouGov shows the Tories with a bigger lead. All in all a couple of excellent polls for the Cons.
A good poll although the LDs will be a little disappointed. “Others” still on the high side, will be interesting to see the breakdown, especially UKIPs share.
21 tim - Yes, against Labour.
21 - I’d expect the spreads to move if Labour get a favourable (super) marginals poll.
27 - I doubt that, the ICM Tory lead has drifted down from 17 to 11 over the last month.
3.I don’t think the Tory posters were anywhere near as panicked as some would have us believe. In Scotland, the Tories will perform better if the media carry on with the narrative of the race being closer rather than a done deal. Back in 2007, it was a real close run battle between Labour and the SNP, and the SNP definitely got a late swing from voters of other parties switching to them tactically to boot out Labour.
That is why they are so skittish about the Conservative position in the polls up here, and tend to point out a dip in their fortunes. I believe that Salmond is attempting to go ‘positive’ again with an anti Thatcher theme to compensate. I think he has got his timing all wrong here, but then I would say that wouldn’t I.
Woah, Chelsea lost a football match…
re 16. Hopefully on Friday or Saturday.
ICM coming into line with everyone else there at a lead just into double figures - roughly what we’d expected here, I think, and seems plausible enough. We shouldn’t waste a lot of electrons on debating the difference between 40 and 39 or the high 20s and 30 - essentially the Tories are currently on the edge of an overall majority. How one judges the outloook is something we might differ on :-). Interesting how strong Others still are, though. We could do with a poll asking what Others will do if their preferred party doesn’t stand in their patch (which will be the norm).
re 29. But Labour have slumped back sharply from a year ago when ICM had them only 4 points behind. We can all play your silly game of finding a poll to make a comparison that suits our purposes.
As someone who despite everything still gravitates towards Labour,I for one would take holding 240 seats as a ‘good lose’ outcome-would imply c.50 Lib Dems,30 others and c 330 Tories,therefore an overall majority of 10
Crosby Yougov probabilistic
Con 344
Lab 217
LD 51
SNP 12
PC 5
Oth 3
NI 13
Con maj 43, 1.4% swingback to hung parliament
Crosby ICM probabilistic
Con 328
Lab 234
LD 52
SNP 11
PC 5
Oth 2
NI 13
Con maj 11, 0.5% swingback to hung parliament
Labour seem to be creeping up…
FPT Richard Nabavi & PfP
I cant see the Tories any more than 12% ahead on polling day. In the very near term Labour have the PBR to get through which might pull polls a couple of percent. If it goes Tory thats one thing but if Labour get a slight boost it might stick.
31 Ironically,a Chelsea fan took the p1ss out of West Ham’s drubbing by Man U-when this guy watches Match of the day he’ll be laughing on the other side of his face
39. Compared to this time last year the drift donwards for the Consvatives is actually smaller. This should be a good time for Labour, with the shift of the media narrative, Cameron finding himself in hot water with his party over Europe and the general mood amongst the public, which in December is one of switching off from politics and spending money they don’t have on rubbish - How New Labour is that? To still be 11% behind with ICM and 13% with YouGov should very disappointing for Labour, IMO.
So nothing has changed. Lead is consistently 10-14%, Tories about 40, Lab under 30 and LDs stuck around 20. Amazing what an outlier can do for political discourse.
29 tim - Yes, but no-one took the 17-point lead seriously - punters were factoring in some noise on that, assuming (I would guess) a more realistic 12 to 14 point lead. What has caused Tory ‘jitters’ (as Mike puts it) is not the fact that this has dropped back a couple of points, but the fear that it was an early indication of a trend. Even though I admit to some jitters myself, I’ve never believed that a trend was starting, because the political drivers haven’t been there; a good PMQs, a couple of good one-liners, and a spat with the Sun don’t move mountains.
Meanwhile Brown is still in place, and the Brown train is heading at speed towards the PBR buffers. Short-term Labour backers should take profits, IMO.
Of course I might be completely wrong!
33 – NPMP, “a poll asking what ‘Others’ will do if their preferred party doesn’t stand in their patch”
A sound idea, just the sort of thing OGH should ‘suggest’ Angus Reid carry out.
Thats to Tim at 29.
The polls - we just don’t know how this will pan out.
The problem is that every poll shows the Tory support to be enough, yet still shallow. That probably reflects reality. Can the Tories get a majority? No-one, including them, can know for sure.
This is why there is still so many options, including a hung Parliament, that are still on the table.
Of course the reality is that even if the Tories can get a majority, they are still going to f**k it up. That is a crisis that will not go away in June 2010. Cameron and Osborne are just not going to be able to face the British existential crisis.
A great world for punters- a very tricky world for the political class. (oh good)
34 - Yes of course, but the spreads reflect recent polling, and in my opinion ICM in particular.
The last 10 ICM polls have shown leads of
14,17,16,17,14,19,17,17,13, and now 11.
36. “Labour seem to be creeping up…”
Except on YouGov where they are creeping back.
Keep spinning Rod.
Bloody hell,my figures were back of a fag packet pen and calculator job,and they’re within a cigarette paper of Rod Crosby’s degree-level maths data-I’m not dissing Rod for a second,as on US election day I called 48 out of 50 states correctly (the two I was wrong on were lost by under 1%),and I called the margin of victory within 0.25% of a percentage point (this was in a conversation with a friend at teatime on Tuesday 4th November 2008)
I’m either clairvoyant,or have pockets of outrageous mathematical ability! :winkL
30 - that was pretty significant the breakdown of LibDem forced choice for Lab / Con in Scotland (7:1) - as pointed out in the previous thread surely that makes Con gains in EdSW, Renfrewshire East, Stirling, Argyll and Bute, Aberdeenshire W / Kincardine etc look v. problematic. I’ve never believed for one moment that they have a serious chance in Ed S - so it’s a case of DCT, gaining D&T, and possibly Roxburgh and Berwickshire now - anyone wish to advance on 3 Conservative seats in Scotland at the GE.
36 It don’t mean a thing, if it ain’t got that swingback, eh?
Wot? No hung Parliament? No AV general elections?
And I was so looking forward to 30 years of the Gordon & St Vince show
Personally I’ve thought it most likely that Cameron would win a 1979 size majority and Labour appear to be getting back to the levels of seats that Callaghan won.
Something I’ve been wondering this week is if people are reluctant to vote Tory because of Cameron’s background then how would they be doing if they were led by a younger version of Thatcher or Major, both of whom came from pretty humble origins.
GIN
“and the general mood amongst the public, which in December is one of switching off from politics and spending money they don’t have on rubbish - How New Labour is that?”
And in January reality returns with the credit card bills and this year the extra bounus of a VAT rise.
52 - But wait Gordo has his big Afghan talking shop to play at World Statesman of the Year at the end of Jan….
Rod, we’re a year nearer the election yet YouGov shows the Conservative lead to be +6 on this time last year and ICM shows the Cons +6 as well. Is this some sort of reverse swingback?
45. tim
That’s true but Labour have already risen by about 15 seats on the Betfair seats market.
And there’s a belief that any extra Labour support is coming largely in Labour strongholds.
Ohhhh,
In an interview for The Politics Show on BBC 1 tomorrow Mr Cameron hits back: “If Gordon Brown and [Lord] Mandelson and the rest, if they want to fight a class war, fine, go for it. It doesn’t work.
“It’s a petty, spiteful, stupid thing to do but if that’s what they want to do, you know, go ahead.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/election-2010/6737808/ICM-poll-puts-Conservatives-back-on-course-for-general-election-majority.html
52. Indeed. Reality returns in January. For the British public and the Labour Party.
A new way of visualising the polls. Last six polls…
http://www.titanictown.plus.com/hp/test.png
GIN
Rod’s swingback model includes the words ‘ignore’ and ‘exclude’ and starts only at the point of the highest Conservative lead.
3, hunchman “Amazing just how panicked some Tory bloggers were with the polls over the past fortnight.”
They know both too little AND too much!
41 - Richard, we’re discussing two different things.
You know that I think that with Brown in place Labour will lose and likely to be 40/30/20 ish.
My point regarding the spreads is two fold, one is that are underpricing Labour by about 25 seats from the 203 that I bought at and secondly they tend to reflect ICM pretty closely.
When ICM were showing Labour 17 behind in October the dropped below 200 when a 17 deficit was predicting a seats total of 190, now at 11 we;d be looking at Labour seats at 235 so its still a buy.
Just before the Conferences began the polls were:
ICM: 43-26-19-17
YouGov: 41-27-17-14
From that we can see a slight reduction in the Tory support a slight increase in Labour, LibDems up a touch and others moving down.
So move away from a big stage political event and nothing much changes. The PBR will have an effect and then it will settle down. It’s where it settles that matters.
On Ipsos-MORI it looks like they indicated a trend at that point, but exaggerated it far too much.
58 Rod - Could you add a linear regression to that and extrapolate to May 6th?
15.Gabble, keep highlighting the hung Parliament scenario in big bold type, ta.
29 RodC
Labour seem to be creeping up…
But the short term momentum is back with the Conservatives. Labour still have the PBR to navigate through the press and it is difficult to see how this can be spun in their favour.
I guess the polls will end the year much as they were in mid summer: 41-43;26-28;18-20;13-15.
The best opportunity for Labour to generate swingback will be late January (recession exit) to mid-March (pre NI increases).
NPMP alerted us to information from his Tory mole that the Conservatives plan a major advertising campaign in this period.
The interesting times lie ahead.
60 - yes, very much like the AGW protesters today.
I bet they’ll all be telling their grandchildren in years to come that they went on the demo - not!
Our Glorious Leader has done a podcast on how he will save £400m through the novel mechanism of putting things online
http://tinyurl.com/HarkToTheWisdomOfSupremeLeader
Includes the following wonderfully incongruous sentence:
65. Thats interesting. What are the Cons planning to advertise about?
Once again the others are very high indeed!
Come on, Farage in Buckingham!
Have we done this?
Revealed – the Labour MPs who attended grammar schools
http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/news/edwest/100018840/revealed-the-labour-mps-who-attended-grammar-schools/
And I take it that doesn’t include those that attended private schools, such as our own NPMP (some posted that a few threads ago I seem to remember).
47 - Test your clairvoyance. Declare the next ten West Ham victories and then compare!
68 - Probably us being the last major country to be out of recession/ it was the deepest and longest recession ever*
*well since records began
So, the tories gold-standard pollster, ICM, has dropped their projected majority from 170 to just 20.
Why has this happened? Mainly the recovering economy and improved optimism - and there’s plenty more of that to come before the next election.
tories = toast
William Hill are still offering 11/2 on a hung parliament with David Cameron as PM but the max they would let me put on was only £9.10! Has Sidney been having a word with Uncle Victor too?
70 (cont) Found like to private schools,
http://www.workingclasstory.com/2009/12/labour-toffs.html
Those two lists together, a lot of Labour MP’s there. Not sure Gordo attack is a good idea really, does he really think all private schools aren’t the same will work?
75 - Interesting to notice a certain MacGabble, I mean MacShane is on the Labour Toffs list.
23,37 Richard, Yokel - I think we’re all in agreement, Labour are favs to win the handicap with the LibDems possibly just second. If Labour can achieve 28%+ of the vote they look unbeatable - the Tories would need 43%+ and the LibDems would need 21%+, both scenarios currently appear unlikely.
Labour’s mini boost, such as it was, looks to be over. The GE seat spread look about right for now imho.
67 - good old interweb.
Tonight’s polls are very much within the recent range. Some Tory relief certainly - though Labour can point to the smallest Tory lead with ICM since April. I expect we shall hear from Populus on Monday evening!
After the PBR, I suspect we will be back to Con42 Lab26 Lib19/20
As my old grandad used to say “If things don’t change, they stay as they are !
Relatively good news for the Conservatives - therefore, unlike last week it will not be reported by the BBC whose job is not to inform, rather it is to stop you finding out.
73 Gabble
There’s over ten thousand people on Teeside who will disagree with you in particular today.
They’ll be a lot more when the tax rises get announced.
73. Lisbon.
Responses to post 40 on previous thread from Sussana…….
You have to hand it to posters on PB.Com. No other site does righteous indignation like it!
(I think she might have been using hyperbole)
78
and its a staged photo too. That print is far too small for Gordon Brown, Dont they e mail him in “36″
48.hunchman, I think there was a late swing to the SNP in the Holyrood elections which saw a lot of tactical votes going their way on the back of the anti Labour mood. We need that type of swing in our target seats on GE day rather than a national swing across a pile of seats we stand no chance in. I wouldn’t bet the outcome of the next GE so far out on that Mori finding.
83. Lisbon
True. Cameron’s lies will not have helped.
73.
Gabble,
shut up your giving us all a headache!
If we didn’t all feel such enormous levels of pity for you, we might find you funny!
67 wibbler - Well that’s great, and of course all savings are very welcome, and I’m pleased that Gordo’s thoughts are belatedly turning to saving taxpayers’ money rather than hosing it down the drain.
However, without wanting to seem curmudgeonly, £400m is less than the daily amount by which expenditure exceeds income. Maybe he needs to look a bit harder.
87 - Have you decided if you support “Tickets for the Troops” yet?
O/T Sarah Palin has now started calling for Obama to boycott Copenhagen due to the Norwich e mails, and has also declared the Obama Birth records theorists to be legitimate.
Over on PB2 No More Tiers for Labour?
http://politicalbetting.blogspot.com/2009/12/no-more-tiers-for-labour.html
With Norwich at the centre of yet another political storm with the Climategate saga, it’s been a bit frustrating for Bunnco as Your Man on the Spot in Norfolk with the UEA in lock-down mode. Despite a bit of digging, there’s no juicy intel to report on the Climate story that hasn’t already been covered in WattsUpWithThat. But like the proverbial bus you can wait forever and suddenly two stories come along at once so tonight I’m going to write about something that we’d all thought had gone away – Local Government Reorganisation [LGR] in Norfolk, Suffolk & Devon.
30
Yes you would say that Christina but that in itself does not make your comments invalid.
I was interested in the MORI poll this week (29 November) in Scotland which shows the Nats back ahead for both Holyrood and Westminster.
SNP 34 LAB 32 CON 15 LIB 12 (WESTMINSTER)
SNP 36 LAB 32 CON 12 LIB 12 (HOLYROOD)
There were three points of interest.
1) For Tory and Liberal it is the lowest recorded MORI share since 2005 for Westminster.The Tories are understandably edgy about Scotland.
2) The Sun, Record and Mail all reported this as a Labour lead based on a Labour press release changing the MORI figures from certain to vote! If we think the press are rubbish down here, see them in action back home.
3) Salmond’s target of 20 seats is not out of the question under the right circumstances.
He may well be going postive in the campaign which will make a huge contrast with Lab/Tory who are set for the most negative campaign in history.
If so he will be right.
82. another richard
There are literally hundreds of thousands of people who would now be unemployed if the tories had had their way.
“Unemployment is a price worth paying” - that’s what you like to say, isn’t it?
hunchman “Amazing just how panicked some Tory bloggers were with the polls over the past fortnight.”
Not me - to coin a phrase ‘I’ve been intensely relaxed’.
I think worrying over poll changes nothing has happened to alter the narrative is just silly.
74 Goupillon - As I suggested in a ** Betting Post ** this morning, this looks like a good value bet, but I was similarly restricted as to how much I could invest. Initially, I thought this was due to Hills’ overnight computer limiting the size of bets, but I encountered the same problem later.
It’s pathetic really, the UK’s 2nd largest bookie and they won’t accept a bet of more than a few quid! A problem I have sometimes had with PP, but never with Ladbrokes - all credit to them.
89 - It seems the 40% economist has had another numeric error.
Treasury figures showed the Conservatives’ plan to save £400 million a year by scrapping means-tested tax credits for families on incomes over £50,000 will only bring in around £45m.
http://www.heraldscotland.com:80/news/politics/tories-to-delay-tax-breaks-for-married-couples-1.989855
So the latest polls confirm that (a) the recent trend with the Tory lead shrinking is still with us and (b) both ARS and MORI were outliers.
If the next ARS poll gives an 18 point lead with every other pollster around 10-11 will we still see the claim that ARS must be right? And all the others wrong?
Anyway, bring on the PBR!
84: The fact that you can put ‘child rape’ and ‘hyperbole’ in the same ballpark says a lot about you Roger
95 - I thought you were refusing to vote Tory because they still believed in climate change.
99 - Not like Roger hasn’t got form on bad taste comments, Jacqui Janes was one such target.
69. Evenin’ all. Good polls for Cameron. Yes - ICM is down but the key point is that the Cons are back at 40 and Labour are still in the 20s despite what was reputed to be a good week for them. And I must say I’m surprised by the movement in YouGov. In my view Brown and his spin machine have made some key errors this week:
1. Class war is a major turn-off for the vast majority and particularly puts off non-core voters.
2. Brown seen to play silly games rather than serious politics (similar to point 1 but slightly different).
3. Brown should not have gone on about ‘flat earthers’ - a snotty insult to a rightly sceptical public, who don’t know who to trust on any subject now. Brown’s put down contributes to a sense of ‘hubris creep’.
Cam meanwhile has had a good week. Yes, he looks like a spiv in his suit in Kabul (who advised him to dress like that?), but he spoke well and with conviction. He sounds like a leader.
Maybe it will be a good Christmas for the blues after all.
91. how many “University” of East Anglia climate “scientists” does it take to change a low carbon lightbulb?
And remind us please how many Nobel prizes this prestigious institution has collected?
I think it’s the first pair of ICM/YouGov polls for a while to show the Tory lead lower with ICM (which Tories tend to refer to as the “gold standard of polling” when the Tory lead is higher). If that’s not MOE stuff, it has to be about the balance of ‘certainty to vote’ shifting (because ICM weights for it and YouGov doesn’t). Part of the big Tory leads earlier was simply very low Labour certainty to vote - it’s not unlikely that this is changing as the election approaches.
I see Oracle’s stalking me again - FWIW I grew up abroad so didn’t have an option of going to an English-speaking state school. I was sent to the local international schools (which I guess were by definition private, if you want to make anything of that). My take on the Eton thing is in my current email circular (point 2) which goes to the 10% of constituents who asked to get it:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/BroxtoweInfo/message/518
93.Keep up the hyperbole on the back of one good poll since your conference season. It immediately sets off the ramping about the SNP performance in the next GE again, and equally, it totally down plays the predicted performance of the other parties. The Tories have nothing to lose credibility wise, we currently have 1 MP.
“For Tory and Liberal it is the lowest recorded MORI share since 2005 for Westminster.The Tories are understandably edgy about Scotland.”
This poll is like a premier stash of nuts for a squirrel going into hibernation over the winter, and it will be dragged out time and again between now and the next GE. Why, because the SNP desperately hope that it will be 2007 all over again after the ‘hung by a Scottish rope’ strategy bombed. The message will be its an SNP vs Labour fight at the next GE in Scotland, aye right.
71
Assuming a short FA Cup run,as West Ham host Arsenal in the 3rd round on Jan 2nd,it could well take into early in the 2010-1 season for our next ten victories-but not by far.
West Ham will finish 14th this season,give or take one palce either side,and finish on 43 points,give or take 2 either side.
And respect to Stoke City;I believe you’ll be around in the top flight for quite a while
“if you want to make anything of that).”
Well, your leader is.
Interesting polls. At this rate Labour should be back in the game by about June.
I listened to Any Questions today and the usually cool Daniel Finkelstein seemed seriously alarmed by the ‘Toff attack’. Though he said it would be a disaster for Labour he was quite unconvincing and sounded quite rattled
A chink of light has appeared and ICM and others seem to have picked it up.
104 - Not stalking you, just pointing out you have been named on the list. If you wish for them to correct it, maybe you should contact them.
However,
“I grew up abroad so didn’t have an option of going to an English-speaking state school. I was sent to the local international schools”
Was the local native speaking school not good enough for you?
108: Seeing as the election will be 95% certain to be May or before thats a little worrying no?
The lead feels like about 13 points to me, so any poll reporting a lead between 10 and 16 is correct, allowing for MoE.
The 6 point lead was, as most of us said at the time, a patent rogue.
Of course, if a series of polls came in showing a lead of around 6 points, we would just resort to Mike’s Nature trick to hide the decline.
Aw,poor old Norman Lamont-when he lost in Harrogate I recall a banner stating ‘If it is’nt hurting it is’nt working’ was unfurled by students,complete to a tape recording of ‘Je ne regrette rien’
Thing is,I used to be friends with a Kingston (Lamont’s old berth) consitituent who categorically stated he was a really nice guy- I pity him for having had John Major as his boss
110: Clear Nick Palmer’s parents didn’t think much of Cophenagen or Vienna’s educational systems.
109 (cont) I believe state education in Denmark and Austria is extremely highly ranked in the world ratings.
109 - Oracle, you seem to be after EdP and MTFs crown as the dimmest poster on here at the moment.
Can you up a level please.
I’m bored.
Polls have stablized. We have days and days until the PBR. No big political news scheduled till then, though we have Cameron looking like a PM-in-waiting over in Afghanistan.
It’s hilarious reading Labour tweets about him; they just can’t stand the fact that he looks good there.
I think it is therefore time to remind ourselves that Vince Cable is not able to chair the G20 table
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GWbfvZF7-WQ
108. either a very good self-deprecating joke, or you are very thick. which?
109. No objection to Palmer stalking, but that is possibly the weakest point I have ever seen made on this forum.
115 - zzzzzzzzzzzzz, still waiting on your university and qualifications. For man who like to throw around the “dim” insult you seem very unwilling to reveal your level of academic achievement.
115: Can you stop being an arse?
Oh no….wait….you can’t. Sorry.
106 - I actually do hope WestHam survive as I’m a big fan of Zola. Truly one of the nicest foreign imports into English football.
As to the Potters, our home form is not as strong this season BUT we are now getting more points away. It’s nice to think that once away from the Big 4 we are no longer looked on as an easy 3 points. Plus Tuncay got to play a full match today. I hope that he becomes the star for this club that he could be. I remain of the opinion we will finish between 9 and 13th this season.
119 - Tim doesn’t like it cos I caught him out on his 12hr w##kathon, which was basically was bashing a service charity yesterday.
Gabble
Lost the argument again haven’t you.
And don’t talk to me about unemployment, I’ve seen people I’ve worked with for years lose their jobs because of Labour’s incompetance and seen my taxes spent of bankers’ bonuses.
Gordon Brown the factory shutter.
Gordon Brown the bankers friend.
118 I think we need to know how many letter of qualifications he can put after his name.
I have at least 6. (and no (hons) does not count).
Meanwhile, we seem to have had another mini race riot
http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2009/dec/05/edl-march-violence-nottingham
without anyone really noticing.
117 - Not sure my point is as weak as NPMP own reasoning for his very expensive living arrangements at our expense. “inconvenient to live somewhere cheaper”.
And apparently public sector contracts are going to organized crime outfits
http://www.scotsman.com/latest-scottish-news/Public-sector-contracts-warning.5887247.jp
my probabilistic rolling average is now showing a Con majority of just 1, down from 13…
(the two 14 point leads drop out)
http://hungparliament2010.blogspot.com/
109, 113: I didn’t make the decision, being quite young at the time. You’d have to ask my parents, which is difficult since they’re dead. But as I recall their view was that I’d lose too much time learning the language and would fall behind my age group. When I was old enough to decide for myself I did go to Copenhagen University, and I did in fact fail my first year because of the language snag, though it worked out in the end.
128 - Well we all knew you would use the “my parents” choice, but your party don’t seem to apply that same logic to the likes of Cameron.
For once I agree with Heffer
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/comment/columnists/simonheffer/6729062/Forget-climate-change—save-the-planet-from-the-thermomaniacs.html
Google now showing 31m hits, nothing to see here - move along now…
128: So you didn’t make the decision….
Funnily enough neither did Cameron, or any other number of people.
Does that not sound a little like double standards?
45 Tim - if you really think the trend is your friend, there’s a £100 here says that Labour will not get within 9 points (or less) of the Tories with ICM before the General Election… ie, the Tory ICM lead will remain in double figures until the GE.
Headline percentage, rounded to the nearest whole number.
Are you on?
“I didn’t make the decision, being quite young at the time. ”
I look forward to you making this point in the House the next time your leader goes on about schools.
Nick Palmer perhaps you should ring Brown and point out that Cameron didn’t have a choice either. But then Brown believes in punishing the sons for the sins of the fathers - if the fathers have made the mistake of making a quid or two that is. What evil is that!
Oh, and why does Gordon Brown want IHT for the many not only for the rich few?
Electoral Calculus
YouGov 66 seat majority for Tories
ICM: 30 seat majority for Tories
Electoral Calculus
YouGov 66 seat majority for Tories
ICM: 30 seat majority for Tories
130 - So, to paraphrase Heffer, “I am against it, because i want to be against it (and the BBC are for it)”.
A good international school in Cophenagen and Vienna…
Sounds hmm I don’t know quite privilaged. Your lucky your parents wanted the best education for you and were willing to pay for it.
Well if the BBC are for it, they shouldn’t be. They are supposed to be impartial aren’t they?
With his comments above I think it is obvious why NPMP has never progressed in parliament! Imagine if Paxo gave him a grilling! He gets himself tied into knots over his rented flat (when he has done nothing wrong), his Gary McKinnon stance and and now his schooling to name a few things.
120 I’d agree re Stoke City finishing comfortably mid-table.
(BTW Does ‘The Naughty Forty’ (Stoke’s rent-a-mob) still exist;just curious-I hasten to add I’ve never been into that)
I did take part in a mass celebration pitch invasion on May 8th 1993 when West Ham won their last game ensuring automatic promotion-about 3000 people including me ran on from the South Bank when the second goal went in,and there was still c.20 seconds of the match left-the ref blew his whistle,and west and east sides poured on,causing the match to be abandoned 20 seconds short -as we were 2-0 up,it’s safe to say thwe outcome was legitmate!
I am much more interested in Hogwarts School of Statistical Wizardry (East Anglia) than in tim’s own academic background. I note that a senior member of the science faculty has recently taken extended gardening leave. Perhaps he could pass the time by writing a history of the UEA with brief portraits of the leading half dozen or so Nobel prize winners the place has produced? Is there any flaw in this plan?
132 - Yes I’ll take that.
I win if one ICM poll shows a Tory lead under 10%.
A fine day to return to the heavily lactating Good News Nipple of pb.com.
Yay. I told all you fritting Tories to chillax. The Lisbon Surrender was an irrelevance, Brown Bounce 7.8 (beta) is now in abeyance.
In fact I think Labour have already overplayed the Class War stuff. It came over pretty good in the Commons, but it views badly on TV. The Labour party closely resembles a lot of nasty desperate faux-working class incompetents who will do, say, and try anything to win the next election.
And talk about hypocrisy. Tories can’t help where they come from. Labourites CAN be judged by what they DO. Put it another way: voters have not forgotten Gerald Kaufman’s claim for a £7000 TV.
Who needs Eton when you can get the taxpayer to buy you a private cinema?
140. Nick’s posts have been getting increasingly thin on content, I’ve noticed. Most of the time we now just get a rather lame and slightly slanted summary of the latest news. I imagine his thoughts have turned to his future after the GE.
143 Yep. OK, tim, I’ll record it will PtP…
Indy on Sunday: Darling actively considering bank windfall tax
145. I’ve noticed the same. He says it’s because he is “busy”. Doing what?? How many times can you reformat a CV?
141 - I had a friend who used to work behind the bar where the Naughty 40 went. I think they’ve pretty much had their day now, certainly I’m not aware of any of them being around. We have enough young pretenders though which I feel will always be a problem when the club comes from a marginalised city. Is it any wonder that the BNP are on the rise there? In fact Labour walked away from running the council, leaving it in a Con-lead coalition. In fact I know the guy who runs it having scrutinirred for him at a council election years ago. But to be fair the club do there best and the ID scheme has now been suspended for away games, which is a good step forward. Trouble is we’ve got enough idiots at times to mean it will never go away…
defending npmp takes me way outside my comfort zone but most of the points above are preempted by the blog he links to at 104.
The simple and neatest solution to the climate change issue is to introduce widespread green taxation to try to change behaviour, and spend it on mitigating the effects of climate change in the third world. Whether you agree with man-made climate change or not, most are agreed that climate change, of some variety, is happening and has long lasting effects on the poorest people on earth.
That way the money is spent on a good cause, even if the belief that the changes are preventable are wrong.
148 - Preparing election leaflets? We have had several reports in the media about a large number of Labour marginals been told no money in the coffers, get on with it, produce your own material, etc, etc, etc.
144. SeanT
Or a £25K watch as in the case of Mandelson.
been -> being
150: We’re not really attacking nick. His own personal circumstances and his view is perfectly acceptable.
However for the majority of the Labour party it is simply Tories=Toffs. There is no deeper logic than that.
Just to say I still regard ICM as the gold standard of pollsters and its a relief to see that they still show the Tories winning a comfortable majority. Looking at last Decembers ICM poll, it could have been much worse.
144 SeanT
Compare and contrast this:
Yay. I told all you fritting Tories to chillax. The Lisbon Surrender was an irrelevance, Brown Bounce 7.8 (beta) is now in abeyance.
by SeanT December 5th, 2009 at 8:43 pm
with this:
Instead he [Cameron] is floundering under 40 percent, we may be headed for a minority Tory government - or worse, and he looks like another devious Blairite chancer rather than a new kind of statesman.
He f*cked up, from every angle. He needs to unf*ck his EU position, quick.
by SeanT December 1st, 2009 at 8:05 am
149.The N40 are in retirement but there is a large contingent of youngsters that still follow and want to cause mayhem,and call themselves N40 even though they weren’t born when the N40 were causing mayhem around the country.
:lol:
The club has done miracles i think to rid itself of the trouble that surrounded it before.
Labour in Stoke have been in meltdown for 6-7 years now locally.If the LD’s had any decent organisation in the area they’d push Labour for the City Westminster seats.
As it is,despite the council problems Labour have they’ll still dominate the North Staffs seats after the election,Staffs Moorlands not included though
150 / 155 - Furthermore to that comment, it is Nick who reacted when I mentioned he was on the list of privately educated individuals in the Labour Party.
He accused me of “stalking”, when all I did was point out, once, he was on the list, and that fact has been found to be perfectly true. It was hardly as if every time he popped up to post, I said “what about all this private schooling stuff Nick”.
159: He does sound a bit touchy about it. Maybe thats why he’s never got in with in the inner cicle. He doesn’t hide it with the bile and nastyness which Ed Balls does.
157. I think SeanT has started to rather revel in diametrically shifting his position every week. It’s almost like he’s playing ‘rent-a-polemic’.
He should be careful though, as such behaviour rather brackets him with the the rest of the miserable hackocracy (e.g Liddle et. al)…
149 Thamks for your answer-thankfully hooliganism has had its day.
Before I go out,an amusing ancedote-about 5 years ago I was in a bar in Bournemouth,and realised I was stood between a Birmingham and a Stoke fan at the bar.My brain said ‘Zulu Army and Naughty Forty’,and I then thought ‘Talk about being the meat in the f***ing sandwich!!’
AS it was ,the two guys were mates and got on well,but for a moment my blood ran cold!
151. Climate change, otherwise known as “weather”, has been with us for quite a long time. The Romans seemed to cope when they were able to plant vineyards in Lincolnshire.
And you want to tax this, somehow? You might as well put VAT on sunlight.
Taxing the use of fossil fuels makes much more sense. They are very definitely a finite resource we are burning up very fast.
159. Those with a privileged background who nevertheless are keen to play the revolutionary have always had it hard, needing to be that much more zealous than their comrades to allay suspicion…:)
Polling Report
————–
YouGov Tory Majority - 58
ICM Tory Majority - 20
Very annoying this evening, MOTD, Khan fight and Thick of It all on at the same time.
165. Very good polls for the Tories.
161 runnymede - To be fair, I think Sean provides a very useful early-warning service in picking up changes in the direction of the political winds. It’s just that they are not always major hurricane warnings.
Can’t help feeling that it’s only Scotland which is keeping Labour above 25%.
I’m sure that in most English and Welsh constituencies the Labour vote will fall by at least 10%.
SeanT
Any reports on how your lefty friends are viewing class war?
169 - I don’t think you are alone in sharing that view.
I think the days of any party getting 40% of the vote are gone for good, but it won’t stop the Tories getting a substantial majority.
According to BBC News Yougov have given the Tories a 15% lead.
The seat forecasters don’t factor in.
i) a couple of SNP holds against the Tories
ii) probable LibDem incumbency bonus
iii) a slightly unfavourable distribution versus Labour at these polling levels
all of which would tend to reduce the forecast Tory majority by about 15-20 seats…
If you are on the same side as Palin and Heffer you’d better get some new supporters, quick. They are two prime indications that you are attracting the wrong people.
As I stated last week, the opposers to global warming are not the sort of people who inspire any confidence. With such a narrow range of supporters then you either have to get a whole new credible bunch of supporters or re-evaluate the argument.
161. I’ve never hidden the fact that I am politically bipolar. I have a bad case of Voter’s Cyclothymia. Plus I like an argument, and will sometimes switch sides just to alleviate my boredom.
But generally I do say what I feel (at that moment) and I think I am a reasonable example of the moodier section of the electorate. And it’s people like me who will decide the election: swingers. Ahem.
I also genuinely believe Brown has over-egged the class war flummery. He just looks like a bitter nasty old lefty from the 70s. Ugh.
158 - Aye Lurker the club have. The only seat I think the Tories could hope to gain there is Newcastle-u-Lyme which Electoral Calculus have down as not safe. The council lost its Labour leadership some time ago and has shown no signs of going back. S-o-T south could be a target with the Electoral Calculus predicting a 6% majority. Central & North are rock solid, though cleverly done, I would have thought the LibDems could slip through in Central on a keep the BNP out. I wonder if the BNP will put some effort into that seat. It was interesting how Mark Fisher popped up as a deposer when Brown wobbled (again) this year…
Knowing Nick Palmer through his posts and emails, I think it is a travesty that he is not a senior minister when the likes of Bob Ainsworth are.
Says all you need to know about Gordon Brown’s judgment.
176 - The centre part of your brain that you have now trained to focus on Europe, but little else is fairly sound.
Richard N but where does Sean pick up those vibes? From the lady boys in Soi Cowboy?
Is this a kamikaze government or are they just unbelievably stupid? I might vote for a clever dick who sails close to the wind if I think his cleverness will sometimes be used on our behalf but I will never support an idiot.
The government seem to have had a big push in the past few days to gratuitously insult a lot of voters culminating in the ‘flat earther’ insult from Gordon ‘I saved the world’ Brown himself.
Whatever his opinion or emptyheadness about the science itself I would have thought that even a pea brained politician would know enough to say that a fair percentage of the voting population have some doubts about the whole global warming circus. Why insult so many people? At the very least politely recognise that not everybody has the same opinion!
I have been voting in General Elections in every election since 1970. I have never voted Tory but I am now considering it. If Cameron says a few sensible things about Global Warming over the next few weeks in line with Nigel Lawson and David Davis I might just break the habit of a lifetime next year.
Here we go again, Tim better get the kleenex in.
The Independent on Sunday says Chris Huhne has demanded to know whether Tessa Jowell’s voicemail messages were illegally hacked by the News of the World when she was media Minister.
178 - I do think sometimes that on present polling, Marcus Wood will enter the HoC and Nick leave it, reducing the level of ability couple of notches.
Huhne is demanding this of whom?
173 - TV, radio or online?
It makes one slightly queasy to think the election campaign is only 17 weeks away. The thought of Brown and co fidgeting on the opposition benches!
183 - But then the opposite could be argued when considering Rory Stewart and NPMP.
182 - Does it matter?
Coulson won’t recollect anything and Cameron is prepared to make a man who bullied someone with mental health issues out of a job, the highest paid employee of the Conservative Party.
180 Witan - As PB regulars will know well, pollsters are wasting their time telephoning 1200 representative voters. The smart punters place their bets based on inside info from Sean, and from Roger’s dinner parties with his Dutch friends and three doctors in Aberdeen.
1888: Awww tim still disappointed by your source which said Coulson was on his way out and Cameron has cleared his diary to do it?
188 - I don’t know, most people don’t seem to think it matters (if the polls are anything to go by), but you seem to get extremely excited about these kind of stories.
This is bad - I’m not saying it as a political taunt at Brown but it is bad news for any leader. Badly wounded soldiers refusing to talk to the PM at Selley Oak.
Do wonder why its taken two months to be reported though.
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/politics/article6945976.ece
Unfortunatly Sion Simon will remain which is a automatic -10 to the average.
192 (cont)
“More than half the soldiers being treated at the Selly Oak hospital ward in Birmingham either asked for the curtains to be closed or deliberately avoided the prime minister, according to several of those present.”
182 - Perhaps Mr Huhne is getting a bit nervous about his prospects in Eastleigh.
188 and Labour makes a man who bullies subordinates its leader and our PM.
186. If the election is March 25th, the campaign will be even sooner! :O
190 - In a way yes.
I don’t think its healthy to have low lifes like McBride and Coulson near power.
177,Hell would freeze over before the Tories win a seat in the City.Newcastle would only fall in a 1997 style wipeout for Labour,there are wealthy Tory areas in the outlying villages but also strong Labour areas in the former Pit Villages.The only thing i can see improving the Tory chance here is a boundary change shifting some of Bill Cash’s empire into the seat,and moving some northern ares into Stoke North
The Tories best chance in North/Mid Staffs is my Moorlands seat and Stafford.Stafford only needs a small swing to fall.
As for Stoke,I’m getting fed up with Pulis doing Rafa Benitez style team changes every week.He’s a Stoke legend in my mind but his team selection is strange at the momenet!!
And David Lammy…..
and Tom Watson
Oh the list could go on and on.
193 - You mean the Sion Simon that wrote the most linked to article in pb history?
http://www.newstatesman.com/blogs/conference/2007/09/labour-majority-increase
However much Gordo and the government wish the issue of the underfunding of our armed services and the terrible number of deaths and casualties the UK military have suffered, it seems the press aren’t going to let it lie.
“Gordon Brown’s toff attack finds voter appeal”
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/politics/article6945970.ece
174. RodC
The seat forecasters don’t factor in the Conservatives doing better in the marginals either.
198 - Or Alastair Campbell, a man who once punched a fellow journlist.
With Labour coming out to offer some form of PR I wonder how many will switch to them?
Gordon Brown is to introduce a law to guarantee that a re-elected Labour government would hold a referendum within two years on abolishing Britain’s first-past-the-post system for elections to the Westminster parliament.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2009/dec/01/electoral-system-reform-referendum-plan
203 - “Only 25% believe tax rises should be spread across the whole population.”
People are going to like the Labour policy of increasing NI then.
“Gordon Brown in ‘nepotism’ row over women-only safe seat”
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/politics/article6945942.ece
206. If Lib-Dems have got any sense they won’t fall for it (again)
192 Ted - Hmm, as you say the timing is interesting.
However, where’s Gabble when you need him? He might like to comment on this quote from that article:
Another soldier, who lost his right leg after being caught in a mine blast in Afghanistan, said that more than two-thirds of the 25 soldiers on the ward closed their curtains. He, however, decided to speak to Brown.
“I wanted to find out how the guy’s head worked,” he said. “I was interested in what he had made of his trip to Afghanistan and what he had learnt from it.
“I feel that even if someone is a moron, he should have the opportunity to defend his moronity. [His response] all seemed rather textbook and not from the heart.
“It is quite obvious to anyone that Brown is not concerned, it is almost as if we [the soldiers] are the product of an unwanted affair.
“The straight fact is this: we don’t like the man, he has done nothing for us and continues to kick us in the teeth over equipment and compensation.”
181. Yes, the “flat earth” sh1t was deeply insulting. Even sensible warmists admit their science is based on probability, not certainty. Doubting AGW ain’t the same as believing in a “flat earth” after Columbus.
Grr.
Talking of liberal-left pieties, check the Guardian article on climategate today. The headline is “Hellbent on sabotage or just misguided? Meet the skeptics.”
Balanced, not.
I used to think the Guardian was the Daily Mail for unthinking lefties who want their prejudices confirmed. Now I realise I was being too nice. The Daily Express is a better comparison.
206 - Is it that time of the month again….
Nine out of 10 Labour supporters and more than 72% of Liberal Democrat voters believe the party is still biased towards the better-off, against 14% of those who support the Tories.
No surprise there, Lib Dem focus groups are behind their hammering of IHT.
A clear majority, 66%, think further tax rises should be concentrated on the highly paid, on top of the planned increase in the highest rate of tax to 50% on salaries above £150,000. Only 25% believe tax rises should be spread across the whole population.
Thats higher than I thought.
203. Nine out of ten Labour voters agree with the Tory Toff attack! Says it all, really.
Yes we have won
Now Camo can dispense with this green nonsense and announce tax cuts for the higher rate payers and increased vat and cutting of state benefits…
Alistair Darling will this week tell government departments that the money has run out and they face a three-year cash freeze on spending.
The message, the toughest to be delivered by a chancellor since the last Labour government was bailed out by the International Monetary Fund in the 1970s, will mean public sector pay freezes and big job cuts. The cash freeze in Whitehall will mean a “real” cut of nearly £40 billion in spending over three years.
It comes amid speculation, played down heavily by Treasury officials, that the chancellor will introduce a windfall tax to curb bank bonuses in his pre-budget report on Wednesday.
http://business.timesonline.co.uk/tol/business/economics/article6945979.ece
Wonder how leading the questions were in the supplementary stuff?
199. Lurker
Labour seem in a bad way in NuL from this year’s local election results:
Con 6511
UKIP 6165
Lab 4896
LD 4317
BNP 1004
Oth 722
“Chancellor Alistair Darling’s £40bn cut in public spending
UK to slide out of top 10 economies”
http://business.timesonline.co.uk/tol/business/economics/article6945979.ece
Are we getting mad counter briefing going on here to try and persuade the chancellor?
213. Your not going to even dent the debt by targeting the rich. Taxes will inevitably have to go up for all of us.
Thanks to Labours economic mismanagement!
216 i agree re the windfall bonuses lets have 90%!!!
216 - Yet another report on the PBR, yet another spin on what will likely be said. I think we have now had everything from “Carry on Spending”, to “We are Bust”.
208 Anyone who thinks a Labour majority of a 6,652 in the East Midlands means a “safe” seat has been very badly advised!
219..But, but….we’re best placed?!?
209 – “Gordon Brown is to introduce a law to guarantee that” yadda yadda.
Gordon Brown has acknowledge that he is untrustworthy and that the LDs would be mugs to trust him, but ‘if I make it law’ well you can guess the rest.
204. True, but there is scant evidence for that
with 174
i) is near-certain
ii) is very likely
iii) is a property of the marginal distribution
I have also factored in
iv) it’s probable that the Tories will receive a modest regional bonus
which redresses the effects of i),ii) and iii) slightly.
220 - They will, but it does show the amazing misjudgement of Osborne enriching the very richest families.
163. The Domesday Book for Herfordshire recorded vineyards in Hertford and Ware amongst other areas. Does this imply a warmer climate in the 11th Century?
How we will possibly be behind Canada in 2015? They have half our population, and I don’t care how badly we do, we’re not going to have half their GDP per capita…
219. Of course that £40bn cut won’t start until 2011 - In other words, it’ll never actually under Labour.
213 tim Only 25% believe tax rises should be spread across the whole population.
So they are going to get a shock if Darling announces honest budget projections.
That is Labour’s dilemma: If you tell the truth, all those deluded voters who think a £200bn deficit can be fixed by taxing a few bankers and a handful of Old Etonians are going to think you’ve kicked them in the teeth.
If you are dishonest, the sums won’t add up and the press (assisted by Mervyn King) will jump on you.
Brown has been very, very stupid in not preparing the country for this. He’s had a year, and has been outflanked by Osborne at every stage.
199 - I hope you’re not on Praise & Grumble demanding Pulis’ head! It’s so funny…
199/218 - On the two seats, don’t forget South does have some strong Tory areas and strong Labour areas. It is NuL that I think is most likely. UKIP are strong and if the campaign team for the Tories can turn them to voting Tory they may surprise. I agree it’s an outlier, but could be worth a few quid on a bet you would expect to loose, but get a nice win if it did turn…
227
tim,
Labour want the many to pay IHT.The Conservatives only think millionaires ought to.
176 I’ve never hidden the fact that I am politically bipolar.
Really? Well, if that’s the case, I think you’ve certainly fooled at least 99% of the PB audience 99% of the time for the last several years.
I don’t know if others have posted this, but it provided some amusement.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/technology/google/6729746/Google-10-Downing-Street-and-the-escort-girls.html
229. All those tar sands will probably have a lot to do with it!
Your hubris does you and your party no favours.
A question for tim. If a wicked evil old Etonian leaves an estate worth 10 million pounds, exactly how much tax will be pay under
a) Cameron’s proposal
b) Darling’s proposal
c) under the present arrangements
235 - Can you imagine Harriet Harman’s reaction to that?
219. “UK to slide out of top 10 economies”
Well done Gordon.
219. I am a realist about Britain’s economic future. We will inevitably become a fairly minor player in global terms, within the next 30 years. Which is why I have become a reluctant europhile.
But nonetheless I find it hard to believe we will be overtaken by Canada and Brazil within just… six years?? Perhaps the CEBR is assuming a Labour government will be in power until 2015, taxing the rich to oblivion and destroying all remaining wealth creating industries.
OT, entertaining thread on Climategate. I didn’t realise Gordo had put his “Flat Earth” comments in print. The Ciffers are going mental
http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2009/dec/04/flat-earth-climate-change-copenhagen#start-of-comments
211. Surely the ‘flat earthers’ in this debate are the global warmists who are following group think beliefs instilled in them by the new establishment. The so called ’sceptics’ are the brave Gallileos who are calling for independent judgement taking them wherever the scientific evidence leads - dissidents going against the grain.
239 - I seem to remember a similar story that showed a knocking shop located / advertised in Harperson’s street.
244 It was on Dizzy’s blog
244 - Really? I’m going to try and find that story
231. “So they are going to get a shock if Darling announces honest budget projections.”
Damn right, that poll shows how thick the average voter is, if all it took to fix the economy was to tax the rich I’d be all for it, it won’t.
231 - Darling should set out tough plans and tax rises that are perceived as fair.
Osborne has sewed in the public mind that the Tories will favour the rich, by his clinging on to the IHT pledge.
The Lib Dems fighting off Tories will love the polling in the class issue.
233 - You can parrott your received wisdom as much as you want, but you’ve been wrong on this issue for a year now and the recent polling shows it.
228. Locally, perhaps.
244. Slightly different. The “massage parlour” near Hattie’s house was real, and has now moved (apparently). This is a spoof advert on Google Maps
245 - Thanks. Found it.
Never ever search for “Harriet Harman Escort” on google. The results are quite disturbing.
BBC3 now: the amazing 30 minute sequence from Hollywood schlockbuster Pearl Harbour, showing the Japanese Attack.
Terrible movie, great reel.
228 - Viking Farms dug out of the present day Greenland Permafrost by archaeologists certainly do. But the world was flat then I suppose!
I would have thought that of all countries in the world the scots like Brown would be happy if it really did get a little warmer. Much of Scotland is nothing but mountains so they are not going to drown from rising seas whatever happens.
Snow in Houston Texas yesterday I see. Earliest snow fall since records began. And no hurricanes to speak of this year despite the usual Chicken Little forecasts from Global Warmers.
239. Another blog site noticed that Harriet Harpic lived within 500 yards of a knocking shop,escort agency ‘cough, cough’?
Gin I would like to look at the questions asked by both today’s pollsters.
The Sir Humph factor is really strong in these sort of ‘knee jerk trigger’ areas.
The other point is that people might think the Tories tend to favour the better off and Labour the worse of or immigrants or whatever. But that has never been a good indicator of voting intention. Indeed the headline of the YouGov poll seems to contradict this ‘internal’
Mrs T was always though to be too posh but a lot of ‘natural Labour voters’ voted for her only moving back when Blair came along. Another posh boy from the Scottish version of Eton.
Much more significant in my opinion is the ‘others’ and what the BNP and UKIP will do to the Labour vote. Norwich must be still giving the Bunker heebie-jeebies.
198.”I don’t think its healthy to have low lifes like McBride and Coulson near power.”
As Mike noted on an earlier thread, classic tim tactic, trying to link Coulson with Mcbride and his disgusting email smears.
229
maybe everyone will emigrate if we get NuLab 4.
Zimbabwe’s starting to look good.
226. RodC
Evidence:
Local election results
Crewe and Norwich North byelections
Polls of marginal seats
Remember it was the Conservatives performing better than average in marginal seats that was one of the reasons that Brown bottled in 2007.
232.I’m a Pulis loyalist,always have been.I can’t believe some Stoke fans don’t like him still to be honest.
Personaly,I’d love to see Labour booted out of existence in North Staffs.They’ve done absolutely nothing for the area and Stoke and Newcastle in particular,but i can’t see it.
Is there any odds for Newcastle under Lyme anywhere??
There is one curious aspect to the IHT debate; why have the Tories not slapped down Labours’ “3000 wealthiest estates” bollocks at every opportunity?
I do wonder now whether they were waiting for the PBR, which probably gets them the soundbite on the evening news if done right.
242 – Scott, great link.
Gordon Brown. So the man who is wrong about EVERYTHING thinks he knows the science. Funny, but according to wikipedia his doctorate was in Scottish Labour Party history, not anything vaguely resembling science . . . Methinks the AGW case just took a big step backwards. Recommended (286).
258
and a complete lack of leadership !
248 Interesting. There’s a different tim posting tonight - either that or his comprehension of the English language has deteriorated in the last few hours.
256 - I consider running a bullying campaign to drive a man out of his job over a period of years the equal of an email smear.
Don’t you?
241 Sean T No way Canada will overtake the UK, just on demographics (33m vs 61m). Brazil (191m) might (and should) but not within 6 years.
In the Sunday Times PBR article they say that the poll wants the deficit dealt with mainly by cuts not taxes by 52% to 30%.
223. MM
Sherwood 2009 local elections:
Con 11703
Lab 7838
Ind 3407
UKIP 2541
LD 1058
BNP 905
EDP 602
Nor is it the time and place to have one of Brown’s creatures as candidate.
266. Sadly it’ll have to be both.
I have a warm, comfortable feeling that Brown is going to make an epic prat of himself at Copenhagen. The combination of world-saving opportunities and the proximity of The One are going to make kitchengate and obamabeachgate look like, um, a day at the beach. in fact looking further back to region1dvdgate has he ever been in Obama’s presence without suffering a near-terminal pratfall?
264 – Tim, no one in their right mind thinks that, your post shows what a twisted sicko you are.
264 Bullying in the workplace? Meet Glenda Stone. She’s an expert at it, and a government adviser to boot.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/femail/article-1233305/Glenda-Stone-boss-hell-Labours-ambassador-women-work.html
258. still scant evidence…
I’m not saying it can’t happen, but until I see something definite, I’m not building it into the model.
We may (probably will) have to wait for election night to find out…
261 - And Pachauri the man in charge of the IPCC the UN Climate body, is a Railway Engineer and economist. He’s convinced of Man Made Global Warming. Just don’t get me started on that scientific genius Al Gore..
264.So why is Gordon Brown leader of the Labour party?
269
Looking at those CiF comments on ‘Climategate’, I’m amused at the naivety of the leftists who can’t understand that big energy companies are going to make as much money out of ‘renewables’ as they do out of fossil fuels. Look at the petrol ads on TV, they are revelling in the global warming story, they’re not going to want to burst the bubble!
253 Lurker Terry
I guess you’ve read Jared Diamond on Greenland dairy farms c1000. His point is that global warming started ages ago because of agriculture and deforestation, resulting in the last ice age not happening. I don’t know where he stands on greenhouse gases, but an obvious conclusion from his writing is that the explosion of human population and agriculture/deforestation are far greater factors in global warming than are recent changes in CO2 levels from industrialisation. I haven’t seen the warmers address this issue - could just be my ignorance…
264
what about driving a civil servant to his death - how does that rate on the Timometer ?
Add another one to the plod investigation,
THE Conservative peer Lord Taylor of Warwick is facing a fresh police investigation into his expenses after saying that a house belonging to his nephew’s companion was his main residence.
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/politics/article6945933.ece
Has Kingston upon Thames’ Conservatives picked their candidate yet?
http://www.arrse.co.uk/Forums/viewtopic/t=139562.html
Only one in two voters accepts man-made climate change, according to new poll
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/earth/environment/6737353/Only-one-in-two-voters-accepts-man-made-climate-change-according-to-new-poll.html
So Gordo only offended half the electorate the other day then…
280 link - “Safe Tory seat of Kingston upon Thames”
???????????????????????????
259 - Couldn’t find any, though glad to see Bet365 have Sidibe on the front page!!! I do know they pop on here sometimes, so it might be worth asking. Always good putting money in Uncle Peter’s pocket (these days)….
280, just linking to what I read.
This will be fun
HARRIET HARMAN is to accuse David Cameron of planning to reward philanderers on their second or third marriages with tax breaks, while stigmatising former wives left to bring up the children.
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/politics/article6945944.ece
. Nine out of ten Labour voters agree with the Tory Toff attack!
So 10% don’t, wonder where their vote will go, or will they sit at home to watch TV.?
264 How about a bullying campaign to drive a man to suicide, is that ok?
Schools - think we’ve probably wrapped the issue up, and I’ll just refer to my blog link at 104 - as Constant is kind enough to point out, it does respond to the points on the thread. For the idly curious - the Copenhagen school was actually a sort of Open University experiment when I started - we got together with a tutor and took correspondence classes from the University of Nebraska, which in those pre-internet days was pretty weird: we’d get essays and tests back a month or so after we did them. It became a normal school by the time I reached year 9.
The details at 203 are interesting. If I was running the Labour campaign, I’d think it time to open up the “mad obsession with abolishing £1 million IHT” front with a “mad policy of abolishing the top rate of tax” front - the first point has found a chink in the Tory armour, and it could usefully be widened. I know the Tories have downgraded it to ‘lower priority’, but it’s still their state objective, and voters have moved sharply in the opposite direction.
286 - 10% probably didn’t understand the question.
And if anyone still thinks a Hung Parliament would be good for Britain, take a look at Ireland:
http://www.independent.ie/national-news/budget/news/td-quits-coalition-as-pay-talks-collapse-1965205.html
285 - Oh goody, I love it when Harriet Harman gets involved.
No sign of choccygate gaining traction?
Noty blaming you, MD
285, I’m glad Harman is pointing out the shameless and unacceptable sexism that means men have a far harder time getting custody of children.
293, glady to hear it
286
they might agree with it but that doesn’t mean they’ll vote Labour.
More likely Labour will shoot themselves in the foot by allowing parallels to be drawn with their own toffs.
Voters are as likely to vote BNP, EDs, local Nats or UKIP as a result.
285 tim
That’s hilarious.
Is she utterly unaware that the situation is somewhat symmetrical?
288 - Nick, you were the one who got his knickers in a twist in the first place.
No I haven’t read that one of his. Personally I am sceptical about that theory given that pre-20th century it is likely that the increased human population simply replaced large populations of other large mammals all over the world.
I remember reading about interglacial fossils of elephants (not mammoths, elephants) in the Thames Valley. Quite apart from the Little Ice Age the current interglacial seems to be cooler than at least some previous interglacials. Of course those elephants might have been releasing enormous amounts of methane into the atmosphere!
How can it be symmetrical? Women are always innocent, men are always guilty in Harrietworld.
288 - “50% tax rate may only be temporary, hints Darling”
http://www.thisislondon.co.uk/standard/article-23679910-50-tax-rate-may-only-be-temporary-hints-darling.do
Kingston 9,000 to make up, or 18% Not that safe a Tory seat.
For those who think that global warming appears to be the root of all known ills [and grants
]…
Here’s a little list
http://plato-says.blogspot.com/2009/12/global-warming-causes.html
AVE IT TAX POLICY SAVES UK
————————–
Taxing earned income is wrong especially for those highly successful people from poor working classes who earn over £100,000pa. So Ave it proposes a flat rate tax on earned income of 30% with a personal allowance of £10,000. NI is abolished. This ensures the lower earners pay their share whilst ensuring more successful people are not overtaxed. However bankers can pay 99% on their bonuses.
Over spending is bad as this causes debt and this is what persons on handouts or lower incomes tend to do. So Ave it proposes VAT is applied on everything and is increased to 30%. This ensures lower income types pay a lot more for their purchases and properly pay their way. Indeed, interest on borrowing should also attract VAT although not for mortgages.
People need to pay their way on windfalls such as capital gains and inheritances which generally are only received by wealthy public school types with rich parents ie labour mps. So Ave it proposes 50% CGT and IHT including on lifetime transfers with no allowances - except where it is made out of income of honest decent working class types.
All state handouts are bad, unjustified and will be stopped exc state pensions. Persons instead will be given state loans of no more than £50pw with a maximum allowance of £5,000. They will be required to repay these loans at a fair rate of interest 0.5%pw and work off their debt to the state in central communal ’service to the state’ centres located in low productivity parts of the country such as scotland, wales and england outside of the home counties.
Ave it cares!
302, if it’s true then having a colonel running will be a boost for the Tories (assuming he is running for them), given the rather pleasing increase in patriotic feeling towards the troops.
288
so how will you react when the millionaires on your own front bench are given more prominence ?
288 Nick P If I was running the Labour campaign, I’d think it time to open up the “mad obsession with abolishing £1 million IHT” front with a “mad policy of abolishing the top rate of tax” front
I’d have thought it would be better to concentrate on fending off the “mad refusal to face up to the reality of a £200bn deficit” attack.
My previous post should have referenced 277 - TimT
285 Harriet Harman is always good fun and I think the court of public opinion should judge her(after of course an actual court has)
306 - Probably like he did when he found his own benches liked a second, third, fourth,… job after he asked a pathetic question at PMQ’s on the issue of Tory second jobs.
285 - Harriet will drive yet more male voters from the Labour fold, another electoral asset for Cameron along with Brown.
290. It certainly looks bleak for Cowen. If he pushes ahead with the public sector pay cuts Ireland will be set for Winter of Discontent but if he backs down then hecould be looking at a trip to the IMF.
If the budget fails then there will be an election in which Fianna Fail will suffer huge loses. There is huge anger down South about how they’ve wrecked the economy. Bertie Ahern was doing a book signing at my local shopping centre last week, the centre is now mostly used by shoppers from the Republic. He was heckled by some people and apparently one or two had to be escorted out!
Dave should come out against the 0.5% NI increase for those on 19 grand a year and run a tax bombshell campaign, linking it to the 10p tax rise on the poor.
As one of Mike’s rules is that the more DC is on the telly the better the Tories do, perhaps we could test what happens when Hattie is on the telly more. My guess is that Labour’s share would nose dive.
tim December 5th, 2009 at 9:43 pm “256 - I consider running a bullying campaign to drive a man out of his job over a period of years the equal of an email smear. Don’t you?”
Yes I agree that it was awful of Brown to bully Blair out of his job.
312 yes we want public sector pay cuts here: 10%! New public sector maximum £100,000!!!
297 - As ever with Harriet theres a kernel of truth.
A tax system that gives a tax advantage to second and third marriages rather than a partner left to bring up children would be a nonsense.
I’v no idea what the Tory policy is though so I won’t be too judgemental.
Front Pages so far,
http://news.sky.com/skynews/Home/UK-News/Newspaper-Front-Pages-On-Sunday-December-6-2009/Media-Gallery/200912115492824?lpos=UK_News_Left_Promo_Region_0&lid=GALLERY_15492824_Newspaper_Front_Pages_On_Sunday%2C_December_6%2C_2009
314, depends on how many masochistic men and frightfully feminazi wenches there are in the country. I hope there are few such perverts and bigots. (Not that I have anything against masochists other than in this example).
312
Maybe time for Ireland to rejoin the UK. If FF can stand in Fermanagh time for Trimble to get on his bike and stand in Dundalk.
313 he has, but he also needs to oppose the immoral abolition of personal allowances for those earning more than £112,000pa!
And knock the green/enviro stuff on the head!!!
248
Tim, your arrogance as to your superiority in all things knows few bounds.
108 - Rog, you never did answer me last night.
You went to private school, ypur parents were obviously wealthy, you have a very good lifestyle, you have a house in a very expensive part of France and you eat in very nice restaurants.
So, are you a bad toff? or can only tories be true toffs?
I think we should be told
EdP December 5th, 2009 at 9:43 pm
The tag-team-tim member changes at 9pm or the nearest new thread. I noticed this last night. The current duty tim is the one who gives references for his quotes, or he was until I pointed this out last night.
290. I guess it’s all resting on this guy, now…
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7PYbIGmQFLY
“KENNETH CLARKE: Harriet Harman went to George Osborne’s school, Ed Balls went to mine… Sorry Gordon, but the class war is over”
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/debate/article-1233499/KENNETH-CLARKE-Harriet-Harman-went-George-Osbornes-school-Ed-Balls-went–Sorry-Gordon-class-war-over.html
“and voters have moved sharply in the opposite direction [i.e. against cuts in IHT].
by Nick Palmer MP December 5th, 2009 at 9:58 pm”
Have voters really moved against tax cuts? I wonder if this is Guardianistas talking to each other. Most people want tax CUTS, naturally enough. And most people see large amounts of waste in the public sector.
But do carry on, Nick.
I am still mystified by the central paradox why a serious scientific enquiry should be entrusted to a “university” which makes a lot of the upgraded polys look like Harvard. A bit of idle wikiing discloses that the CRU is an even bigger joke than I thought it was. You have to love this:
Initial sponsors included British Petroleum, the Nuffield Foundation and Royal Dutch Shell.[5] The Rockefeller Foundation was another early benefactor… [imagine what the cooling deniers would make of that if it was not producing "evidence" of warming]
and even better this
The first director of the unit was Professor Hubert Lamb. He had led research into climatic variation at the Met Office and was chair of the UN’s World Meteorological Organisation, which already studied climate trends and the effect of pollution upon them.[5] He was then known as the “ice man” for his prediction of global cooling and a coming ice age but, following the UK’s exceptionally hot summer of 1976, he switched to predicting a more imminent global warming.
So much for the argument that long term trends are what matter. We aregoing to bankrupt the world because dear old Prof. Hubert, an Ealing Comedy figure at an Ealing Comedy institution, caught a touch of the sun in Norwich thirty three years ago.
Just on the Toff part of the YouGov poll, the numbers aren’t really a ringing endorsement of the Labour attack.
The article doesn’t say the response to the question from “others”, but on the numbers given, I calculate that amongst Lab, Lib and Conservative supporters, the split is actually about 50:50 (actually about 50.4% agree).
Given the proportion of those who agree that will vote Labour, it does suggest that it is core vote stuff.
322 - I know less about owning dogs than you do, if that makes you feel better.
324
sh!t farming wasn’t this complicated when I was young.
329 - Sorry, I should have said “largely core vote stuff”. There It appears to be an issue for some outside Labours core vote, but not many of them. The chances of this attack effecting the vote of significant numbers of current Conservative supporters looks remote on these figures.
That is what Labour need to do if they want to avoid a Conservative win.
330
so your a fish farmer ?
or a sewage farmer ?
JOHN BERCOW faces being ousted as Commons Speaker immediately after the general election amid cross-party anger about his conduct.
Tory and Labour backbenchers are devising an extraordinary plan: to object to his automatic reappointment if there is a change of government.
MPs from both parties accuse Bercow of bringing shame on the office of Speaker by allowing his wife, an aspiring Labour councillor, to give a highly party political interview attacking David Cameron.
Bercow has also alienated MPs on all sides with his handling of the expenses row, triggering accusations of self-interest and inconsistency over his failure to support penalties for “flipping” properties.
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/politics/article6945971.ece
327 - I don’t see any justification for thinking people have “moved against” IHT changes. There may be people who were ambivalent who are now against it, but these are mostly going to be people in the Labour base.
Schools - think we’ve probably wrapped the issue up..?
by Nick Palmer MP December 5th, 2009 at 9:58 pm
You are not defying the Leader are you, not abandoning the ‘Tory Toffs take lessons on the playing fields of Eton in eating babies’ line?
121 - to be fair to timbot he had just come of a 20 hour shift putting Labour’s case (well ok, sneering and smearing) so we can’t really expect him to be at his best in circumstances like that can we?
327 - Most people might want tax cuts, but most people know they aren’t going to inherit between £700,000 and £2 million quid.
If anyone fancies a bet on the core vote IHT issue, I’ll lay £50 at evens that if a poll is done of Lib Dem voters over 50% of them will oppose the Tory IHT policy.
I now expect a period of herd silence.
338
depends how badly Gordon screws up inflation.
334 Must be music to Mad Nad’s ears!
182. How very gallant of Chris Huhne.
oooh Gordo got snubbed by soldiers at Selly Oak - Sunday Times
Good for them
337 Floater - on my last couple of outings on here I have asked Tim to put Labour’s case. I’d like to know from someone at HQ why I should vote for them rather than not voting for another party.
Still no luck I’m afraid.
If Brown had introduced indexation of IHT in the first place, the issue wouldn’t be so explosive. Instead he allows more people to be caught by fiscal drag.
338 i’m going to inherit * all and i dont want those who have achieved nothing in life but with rich mummies and daddies to end up with more money than me!
So lets get on with the 99% IHT rate keeps it simple! But as noticed earlier at 304 - except where it is made out of income of honest decent working class types
Peronally i hope darling makes the IHT threshold £0 next week!!!!!
Solider snub is front page for the Times.
338 - Surely the 600/700k only applies to spouses/partners. Passing between generations the figure is half that. The 600/700k figure is a red herring, because the driving force behind the issue is inheritance of a family home - which isn’t a difficult issue to get round for spouses/partners.
326 Nice wording by Ken Clarke:
“I went to private school myself, the same one, in fact, as Schools Secretary Ed Balls, Nottingham High School. He attended a few years after me and was a fee-paying pupil, but then he is New Labour. I was an 11-Plus boy, paid for by the State.”
317 tim, are you a single parent?
346 - IHT is a vile tax I’m afraid. The only time my grandparents became higher rate tax payers, was when they died, and left me their house and savings.
Surely not another Labour bully,
Well-placed Government sources claimed that Baroness Young, chair of the Care Quality Commission, was ‘volatile and hot-headed’ and had sent abusive emails to colleagues.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1233532/NHS-feud-hothead-Labour-baroness-accused-sending-colleagues-abusive-emails.html#ixzz0Yr8E3fT2
352 - Or is it another incident out of the standard New Labour playbook, smear smear and smear again?
351 TSE sorry I have to disagree with you - there are so many distortions caused when people with rich families get ahead of those who havent simply due to inheritances!
Keep on with the IHT!!!
tag-team-tim roger chickens out of answerering this question. Perhaps you can use your team to give me an answer:
Why does Gordon Brown want the many to pay IHT and not only the rich few?
334, I actually found the piece underneath more interesting, about preventing the media reporting what happens in the Commons.
345 “Instead he allows more people to be caught by fiscal drag.”
And for much of their period of Government, rampant house-price inflation.
Which, er, Gordon promised he wouldn’t allow.
353 - If we’re talking how bad New Labour smears are, let’s never forget Gordon McMaster
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/special_report/paisley_by_election/19585.stm
351 - Get rid of it completely.
My view is that everyone should have a tax free inheritance allowance of £200k (index link it to house prices) and everything else is taxed as income.
What people also seem to misrepresent about IHT is that just because a relatively asset wealthy person has died, it follows that those that inherit will also become wealthy. If the inheritance is spread around a number of relatives etc, that evidently isn’t the case. The tax isn’t paid on the amount an individual inherits, but the total amount bequeathed.
350 EdP. Gosh I hope not. That would make his stated desire to disinherit his children afor the states even nastier than it first appeared.
359 tim - Is your view based on wanting to raise revenue, or make a political point?
339. ?
Of course they will. Easily. Do you actually mean “lay”?
Speaking as an utterly bovine tory herdperson I think we are in a real bind over IHT. But it had to be done at the time or we would now be 2 years into a Gordon government with him having yer actual mandate of the masses. It is politically very, very difficult.
Happy now?
The Mail has a story about how George Osborne’s brother has converted to Islam.
359 i like the idea of taxing it as income (at the marginal rate like we used to do with CGT) but wouldnt allow any allowance…
192 - that is toxic
“I met Prince Charles and Sir Richard Dannatt [when they visited Selly Oak]. I have respect for them. Prince Charles spoke to me for two hours. I really didn’t want to speak to Gordon Brown.”
“It was a pretty sour thing, we feel a lot of bitterness towards Gordon Brown. The guys read the papers, it is obvious to them that he doesn’t care. Many of us felt like it was an effort to accommodate him.”
why is IHT and issue ?
The issues are a massive public debt, a sick economy, a war in Afghanisatn and the destruction of Civil Liberties.
IHT a spot of light entertainment - but not an issue for voters.
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/politics/article6945976.ece
The story on soldiers snubbing Brown. Pretty severe.
364 - This is the story
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1233537/George-Osbornes-brother-Muslim-marry-love-14-years.html
re my effort at 361. Didn’t make much sense. Sorry. Cut and paste didn’t go quite according to plan.
368, whoops, missed it at 192.
tag-team-tim that is not an answer.
I want to know why Gordon Brown wants the many to pay IHT and not only the rich few.
I am not interested in your opinion but in the answer your boss would give me. Use your contacts and team, ask Charlie or Derek or someone. Get the organ grinder please. And tell me:
Why does Gordon Brown want the many to pay IHT and not only the rich few.
Goddit?
367 we like talking about IHT here!
Lets put a tax on that, a 100% tax on that! (sorry wayne)
360
700k is misleading, not everyone can claim it.
357. “345 “Instead he allows more people to be caught by fiscal drag.”
And for much of their period of Government, rampant house-price inflation.
Which, er, Gordon promised he wouldn’t allow.”
Ah yes a perennial favourite of mine the 1997 budget speech, when Brown is finally kicked out of Number 10 I may have to have one last read of it and a good drink to savour the moment.
266. That is until a programme that is dear to them is proposed as being cut.
To sort out the mess created by this government is going to need a rolling back of the state, on a scale never before achieved.
Margaret Thatcher never really rolled back the state, she just stopped it from growing. The next government is going to roll it back by between fifth and sixth.
This cant be done by efficiencies and getting rid of diversity officers. It will require the full scale ceasing of programmes that are considered important, by all sides.
I would like to point out IHT raises only 0.8% of tax in this country. a mere £3bn or so.
It is a tiny drop in a very large ocean.
375. Glw Is the 1997 Budget Speech filed under satire or fiction in your library?
368 Aaaah - all is now clear.
I assume Brown’s Bunker knew this story was coming out; which is why the concerted effort yesterday to make Cameron’s visit to Afghanistan appear flippant. There were plenty of soldiers in those pictures who appeared to be happy enough to spend time with Cameron. Makes the contrast all the more toxic for the Bunker Boys to take…
216 …. but, but, but Gordo PROMISED investment unlike those nasty tories who he said were going to cut.
oh wait, Labour = lies
Imagine how let down large sectors of Labour voters going to feel when the truth hits them between the eyes…. Gordo has f*cked up royally and we are all going to pay.
Anyway, I’m off to bed (no curtain-drawing necessary, happily).
Night all
260 - “There is one curious aspect to the IHT debate; why have the Tories not slapped down Labours’ “3000 wealthiest estates” bollocks at every opportunity?”
Because its not bollocks? With IHT paid on about 6% of estates the Tories can’t slap down that assertion because it happens to be true.
Look, the argument against the IHT level as it stands is that many ordinary family houses are worth more than the threshhold. Which is true - but estates aren’t going to be paid now. They’ll be paid in 30 years time when they eventually die, when the threshhold has had 30 years of increases.
Anyway, debate the facts all you like, this isn’t about the facts, its about politics. And politically the Tories appear to be advocating tax cuts for the well off (IHT/50p) with planned slashed benefits & services for the middle ground and poor. It might not be factually true, but thats the political agenda in the news.
Perhaps you’re right - why don’t the Tories fight it? Perhaps they don’t want to be seen defending why trickle-down economics will work this time?
368. Morris Dancer. That’s a pretty terrible report for Brown.
Re the Indy front page. Who was hacking BoJo and why?
227 - still lying tim I see.
You have no shame, tut tut
382: Really? So no one in this country is going to die in the next 30years??
Sell shares in funeral homes and florists quick!!!
The real deniers, seem to be those people in the Labour party who presided over the property boom but can’t face the fact that houses in the south of England cost a fortune. Instead it suits Tim and friends to pretend that a house worth over £300,000 is a rarity reserved for toffs and friends of David Cameron only. It’s bad enough that average house prices are now out of all proportion to average incomes, meaning it’s nearly impossible for first time buyers to get on the property market. Tim would rather the state grabbed back the wealth accrued by inflated property prices, than allow this wealth benefit a generation that risk being all round losers. I simply don’t beleive that any family that has managed to acquire property would not prefer their children to inherit, than for it to be clawed back by the state. For many offspring this is their only chance of ever owning property. Why the Conservatives don’t spell this out more clearly escapes me.
369 - Good luck to him.
One of the things I love about this country is that no one will be bothered, who counts.
362 - Richard.
After all the discussions we’ve had on here about IHT its the conclusion I’ve come to.
Give everyone a personal allowance, roughly equating to buying and moving into the average house and tax the rest as income.
Its fair and it would kill the whole bloody issue once and for all.
382 Ian Bailey - I hope your grasp of logic, maths and economics isn’t typical of Labour, although I fear it might be:
but estates aren’t going to be paid now. They’ll be paid in 30 years time when they eventually die, when the threshhold has had 30 years of increases.
Err, yes. But perhaps you should go back and redo your sums, and this time remember that the house prices might also, perhaps just maybe, increase over 30 years as well.
387 - Please keep up Polly.
Tim, please help. Give me some positive reasons to vote for your masters / comrades.
388: Its not fair tim. People work hard for their money, and after they earn it and its been taxed it should be theirs to do with as they please.
That is fair.
There’s always been a rumour that they were after stuff about Boris and Petronella.
I’m sure Coulson would have no recollection.
390. Why not answer the substantive issues Tim? Or are you just too rich to care?
384 Isn’t that just the Indy catching up the Guardian’s non-story of a few months ago?
390:It really is amusing you’re having to fall back on the ‘I’m more intelligent and everyone else is stupid’ line more and more tim….
One might say you’re becoming irrational with it, but then you’ve alway been irrational.
388 - tim, what about companies included in peoples estates? These can be subject to large amounts of IHT but there is often no cash to go with it (in fact, it’s likely that the inheritance will come with requirements for personal guarantees etc).
393 A rumour that you’ve just invented perchance?
378. It ought to be filed under fiction: alternative history.
387 dont forget the reason house prices have boomed so much is cos its been fueled by those whose mummy and daddy have paid for their houses by handouts or via inheritance - this distorts the market and freezes out working class types from poor backgrounds and is WRONG - so this is why we need 100% IHT now!!!!
281 - “So Gordo only offended half the electorate the other day then…”
A better than average day for Gordon then
389 - so the need to cut IHT now is to avoid people having to pay it in 30 years? Just answer the question - are the people whose estates will trigger IHT in 2010 the millions of families living in £400k houses? Or just the usual 6% of people who will die that year?
when did “The Thick of it” cease to be a comedy and start to be a documentary ?
392 - “earned it”
So you are arguing that only earned income should be passed on tax free.
I think SeanT was arguing for a split between earned and unearned income being taxed a few months back.
How would you tax the estate which will be passed on to the Cameron family that has been passed down over 200 years, is that “earned”?
Just one final point on the Tory Toffs poll numbers from YouGov.
According to those figures, if Labours toff campaign was so successful that every single person who is currently planning to vote Conservative despite the fact that they think they are the party of the rich, decided to vote Labour instead then the Conservatives would still be ahead.
Based on the fact that these people don’t seem too bothered about this issue (or they wouldn’t be planning to vote Tory), I’d be surprised if more than one person in 1 hundred had their vote affected by this tactic.
It just ain’t going to work.
402: I’m rather more amused that you think that no one in this country will die for 30years….
403. Headline You Dirty Tucker….
392. The fact is Labour has presided over creating a new generation who have the most insecure prospects of any generation since the Second World War. No stable employment, no chance of getting on the property ladder, no proper pension. Tim is no doubt of that charmed generation that had it easy and is one reason he doesn’t get the anger at new labour, and particularly that magic circle, the charmed new labour network who have dished out jam for themselves via highly paid jobs in the quangos and public sector while ruthlessly driving down wages at the lower levels, creating a new ‘them and us’.
402 Ian - Well, you were the one who raised the bizarre question of thirty years indexation,.
But to answer your question: Yes, IHT is an absolute side-show which raises little revenue, of very little importance in the overall scheme of things (although of course its unpopularity goes well beyond those who will be affected in the next year or two).
That is why Labour’s obsession with it is so strange and counter-productive, especially at a time when the finances are in such a dire state.
326 - now, that was delicious
Looooooooooooooooooool
Oh dear gordo
394 - My post at 388 answers your question.
No takers on the bet at 339 yet?
I’m shocked.
411 - Hopefully that has given Polly satisfaction (so to speak) but please tell me why should I vote Labour?
409 - Richard.
That is why Labour’s obsession with it is so strange and counter-productive, especially at a time when the finances are in such a dire state.
You’re a smart guy, you know that Labour were praying that Osborne would cling on to this policy, as you say, tough choices are to be made and Osborne has made his.
Its a gift and you know it.
Thick of It was brilliant as always…
411; Seeing as your bet was pointless and said nothing I’m not suprised. People might on the basis disagree with it, but then you can find many issues which apply that way with any party. thats why they arn’t voters for that party in the first place.
Poor tim….
Heres a bet….Labour won’t win over 40% of the vote? going to take it? £100 for it…any takers?
No…I didn’t think so.
Malcolm Tucker has done a Damien McBride!
414
Of course - but now it’s reality TV !
411. I hope you’re joking Grendel. Tim has answered absolutely nothing. His party has nothing to offer except spin, sneer and smear.
The lying about Stephen Hawking’s golf handicap joke was in the worst possible taste. Lost count of how many forms the F word took.
359 ‘My view is that everyone should have a tax free inheritance allowance of £200k (index link it to house prices) and everything else is taxed as income.’
£200K? That’s an interesting figure. Let’s have a look at average house prices -
South East - £264,906
London - £260,764
South West -£225,929
Surprise, surprise they’re all regions where Labour cannot expect to very well.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/shared/spl/hi/in_depth/uk_house_prices/regions/html/region5.stm
Thick of it - brilliant.
420 - Plus tim’s plan will mean an IHT cut if you have lots of children.
So ICM comes in around the same as the other pollsters. Tory lead around ten-ish pc and falling.
Voters baulking at thought of letting the out-of-touch Bullingdon set run the country. And I don’t blame them.
418 - Polly, a joke? No not at all. I’m hoping that our local rep for the political arm of the British people has a positive story to tell.
413 ‘Its a gift and you know it.’
And yet IHT is the issue that forced Brown to put off a GE in 2007, and annouce his own copy cat policy.
423.
Except where its rising with YouGov naturally.
420 - As Ave it has pointed out, the Inheritance of properties fuels house price inflation in those areas.
You do sound a slight challenged Kirstie Allsop-Property-Ramper.
I was searching for something earlier and I found a couple of other interesting snippets as well as the thing I was looking for.
Today we learn of soldiers refusing to talk to the pm of the country, they dont even attempt to be subtle about it.
They feel let down, over equipment for example.
Here is an interview Rammell has with Andrew Neil on the subject.
Neil rips him a new one
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1RiSLR4I4LE
Is Malcolm Tucker going to come back working for Peter Mannion?
423..Yeah,,,just don’t mention that YouGov poll which shows the lead going up……
I wouldn’t call IHT a Labour obsession, its a political strategy. A component of the argument that the Tories will give tax cuts to the rich and make the rest of us pay the bill. Is it working? Well, are the Tories being forced to defend it and thus re-emphasise the point over and over again?
I think some Tory posters have forgotten how politics work. Facts don’t matter, individual issues rarely become make or break, the key is generally gut feel - what do voters feel deep down? Tell most people that the people who have to pay the bill for the banking fiasco isn’t the bankers - who get tax cuts - but them, and for some reason they don’t think that very fair.
427 Ah ha, another one of your obsessive themes emerges from the fog that fills your Manc cranium.
432 - Well it would be very stupid to argue that regional property bubbles should be reflected in tax allowances don’t you think.
We’re all in this together.
431 - Labour is going to raise taxes on those earning £19, 000 a year and has previous with the whole 10p tax knightmare.
433 – Get some sleep Tim, even your smears and lies are tired and worn out.
You can dream of misogynistic nastiness against Ms Allsopp and wake refreshed for another 14 hr shift tomorrow.
388. tim, it is only in timworld that this is a “whole bloody issue” which needs resolving once and for all. To the rest of us it is something for GB to be boring about on wednesdays and for you to be boring about 24/7. And I may be stupid but what the feck is your point about Lib Dems. My guess is that they would oppose tory plans by a socking majority. So what?
431 Well…. New Labour and the truth have always been strangers to one another.
People, please ignore Tim when he’s having one of his tantrums. He just wants the attention. Every thread seems to devolve into a slanging match and it’s getting very dull.
My exam resits are next week so I am unlikely to be posting until they are over. Later…
427 ‘Inheritance of properties fuels house price inflation in those areas.’
Wrong. The desirability and availability of land and property in those areas drives up prices. Supply and demand. But then finance and economics isn’t one of your strongest suits is it, Minority Man?
433: Oh look…tim’s remembered his little meme of the week….
Well done, have a gold star.
430. Desperate Tories looking on the bright side? Love it!
ICM was the one the rank Tories posting here were waiting for, and it too now shows the Tory lead narrowing.
Labour just need to keep bringing up the Tory self-enriching IHT pledge to keep the public’s disgust at the Tories to the fore. That and peeling the Tory PPC onion to reveal the motley crew of reactionary AGW denying, free market fundamentalist, swivel-eyed anti-EU, anti-abortion kooks that are standing for them next May.
427 so when a single person inherits a £300k house they are forced to sell it regardless as £100k is taxed as ‘income’ meaning unless they have £40k going spare they must raise the funds from a forced sale.
Taxing it as income will also potentially push a lowish earner who inherits the family home into the higher rate banding thereby reducing their disposable income from their normal employment.
As such, it is not a reasonable way to tax inheritance and is as flawed as your ‘lifetime transfer’ tax you brought up previously.
Oh, make your mind up!
ALISTAIR DARLING will not raise capital gains tax from its present 18% rate in his pre-budget report on Wednesday, despite fears of a “soak the rich” budget.
Treasury sources last night brushed off speculation that the chancellor will announce a windfall tax on banks or bank bonuses.
Though Darling is not expected to increase the top rate of income tax to beyond 50% or announce a new raid on pensions, experts warn that Labour’s tax plans are already undermining the City.
Michael Wistow at Berwin Leighton Paisner, the law firm, said: “In tandem with attacks on non-doms, we are seeing the start of a City exodus following concerns the 50p tax will force the rich to foot the bill for the downturn.”
http://business.timesonline.co.uk/tol/business/economics/article6945949.ece
438. Does he do coke/pills at the w/e?
Only asking.
438 - Good luck Bob.
439: tim’s like a dead jellyfish on a beach. You know you shouldn’t poke it with sticks but its too fun not to. You feel a bit icky afterwards though.
444- one daren’t guess…
445- thanks, I need all the luck I can get!
441 - BenM. OK it seems that Tim is incapable of giving me some positive reasons to vote Labour next year. Perhaps you could help me instead?
438 – Sound advice Bob, good luck with the resits next week.
441 - Labour are static or down in these two polls. Tories are down or up in these 2 polls. As I pointed out upthread we are pretty much back to where we were the weekend before the conferences. But if you think static or down and the high twenties is good for Labour then please go ahead…
441- looks like Tim has some more company in Rorke’s Drift. I will leave you all with a question, which of the Labour herd is Michael Caine? Tim, Ben, Gabble or URW?
ZULU!!
439 this includes the supply of money to buy - really its the transfer of money from wealthy mummies and daddies (whilst still alive) to their children which causes this; not so much inheritance as that only happens when the 2nd parent dies.
Where this happens when the child is young ie when the child is in the teens/twenties this will generally be in poorer families where there is no money to pass on.
Where the 2nd parent dies when the child is in their 40s/50s the child will already have bought a house - although it does cause some distortion further up the property ladder as they can buy a bigger one!
Latvia
Nazis
SS
Ed Balls.
This is where the “advantage of government” plays in Mr Darling’s favour. To get some more positive notes in the PBR, Mr Darling can bury his toxic debts in other associated announcements – a sort of political equivalent of an offshore vehicle.
So, ahead of the PBR will be the Cabinet Office minister Liam Byrne’s report on public sector performance. It will lay out more than £10bn worth of savings by restructuring departments and joining back-office functions together to create efficiencies.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/comment/kamal-ahmed/6736935/Advantage-of-government-in-Darlings-favour.html
441. Of course ICM shows the lead narrowing. Thats because the lead has narrowed a little bit. Trouble is, the lead isn’t narrowing enough. This time last year the lead was much narrower and we all know what happened when we hit January.
With YouGiv showing the lead extending again these are bad polls for Labour in what should be one of the best times of 2009.
448 - I can give you a positive reason for voting Labour.
The looks on the faces of Gordon Brown, Peter Mandelson, Ed Balls et al trying to explain to the country why they’ve cut public spending, after fighting an election campaign of Labour investment v Tory Cuts.
438 But it’s funny. And tim’s funny.
Possible implications in Sheffield?
“Councillor is arrested after drugs incident”
http://www.libdemvoice.org/mazher-iqbal-17070.html
431. Ian Bailey - the IHT history is an odd one. The fallen Blairite, Stephen Byers, proposed cutting IHT but was shouted down by the Brownites. The Conservatives took the opportunity to make it their policy, and Osborne’s IHT speech to conference in 07 was obviously one of the drivers of their fightback in the polls causing Labour to deliver their pale imitation of it in the 07 PBR. Since their embarrassing U turn Labour have persisted in making it the centrepiece of an attack on Tory toff policy that has never had any coherence. Granted the Conservatives have been poor at counteracting it. Nevertheless only a few weeks ago polls were showing that IHT cuts remained a popular policy. I’m not convinced that it isn’t still popular. There is a huge gap here between political rhetoric fitting the imaginary class war Labour is fighting, and the reality of a deeply unpopular tax that most people in our property based democracy would dearly like to see cut.
451: Roger of course…the posh boy who wants so badly to be one of the working classes…damn his poshness…
442 - The average age of inheritance in this country now is such that most people inherit a second house not a first one so its likely that the house is sold anyway.
Chancellor Brown used to crush the opposition with his repeated bellowing: “Better than France, better than Germany” etc. Now Britain is “worse than France, worse than Germany”. We are the only country in the G20 technically in recession and our structural deficit is unmatched.
…
The markets, however, seem a little uneasy. On Monday an investment analyst at Morgan Stanley took fright at a couple of odd polls that showed the Tory lead narrowing. The prospect of a hung parliament and weak government spooked the bank into warning of a sterling and gilts crisis. On Wednesday UBS warned of higher interest rates if Labour kept to its course. On Friday Citigroup’s preview of the PBR worried that Britain’s sovereign debt will have to be downgraded. Got the appetite for a financial crisis, anyone?
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/comment/columnists/martin_ivens/article6945909.ece
459 - You surprise me that you think the recession has not had an effect on peoples views.
Post recession polling suggests you are wrong.
Just seen on UK Polling Report…
http://ukelectiontrend.blogspot.com/
461 - Tim, your IHT plan is an £80, 000 bonus to rich people for having a child.
461 none of which deals with any of the points raised - taxation is not about how it works ‘for most/half/a lot’ of people but how the exceptions work out.
An 18 year old single child losing their only parent working in a £12,000 a year job who inherits the £300k family home has been royally shafted by your policy.
It doesn’t work, it isn’t fair and it will never be implemented by any reasonable government.
456 TSE - Thank you for noticing my mere existence on the interweb thingy. Possibly several good reasons there. But I’m still not convinced. Maybe Tom and Ben think it is below them to respond to me. And they may be right. But a few answers would be nice.
448. No positive reasons exist to vote Tory either.
I’m voting Labour to ensure the lessons learned over the credit crunch are crystallised - that we never ever hand our future prosperity to a bunch of city spivs again; that we embrace the European Union as our only helpline at this time of economic crisis; and that the government maintains strong overall intervention in the British economy while it is being rebuilt after 30 years of Thatcherite ravaging.
Only by voting Labour / Lib Dem will this country continue to maintain the kind of investment in its social infrastructure that will drag us out of the Tory-inspired individualistic doldrums in order for it to reach its full potential.
The Tories on the other hand are riven by ideology and fear. Loopy, baseless fear of the EU (which we control - if only the anti-EU loons would realise this), socially and now economically damaging free market fundamentalism, stone age social authoritarianism and a kind of smug selfishness which, for a British citizen like myself, remains a most major turn off.
So, plenty to vote for (Labour) and an enormous amount to vote against (Tory reaction).
463
I have often thought Tim was a tax exile himself. Now we know he is not in the UK as he is talking of “post-recession polling”.
468. Booting out that party that has bankrupted us and trying to retore some economic sense isn’t a positive reason for voting Tory?
re 464 and from that Election Trend site
I’ve decide to remove Angus Reid from the data set used in the model. This is based on several issues, first Angus Reid are new to national polling and have no track record, their voter intention poll is taken for a betting site rather than a newspaper or TV network, and the polls they have put out have been strong outliers compared to other polling.
What? Is Mike’s money not as good as newspaper proprietors then? I’d think we’d get a fairer assessment of an AR poll on here that the pollsters figures being twisted to suit a particular editorial line, e.g. all the latest hung parlimanet guff or hiding the data for a week to sell more newspapers.
468
you have obviously slept through the last 12 years.
454 Scott P - Blimey, that reads like a leadership bid by Darling.
468 - Ben. Blimey, one of the bloggerati has posted a response. Thank you. Are you suggesting that voting Labour or Lib Dem is the same thing?
461 - Or a dead child tax. If one of your children happens to die then you get sent an £80, 000 tax bill on your estate. I don’t think it is going to sell.
468 BenM, nice work with the ‘cut and paste’ function there. Which leaflet was it copied from?
471 - Is that blog written by Rod Liddle?
468. Ooh, I like this bit
“fear of the EU (which we control”
Is that “we” the British people (who were denied a vote), or “we” the loony lefties who stitched up the appointments in a (non-smoking) room?
471 - I had noticed that. I do think ARS need a few more polls to set a track record. I’m certainly not dismissing them, but it is worth waiting a bit to see how they move around compared with the others. I’m glad to see them and they add in for me another aspect to discuss. Looking at the trend graphs it’s interesting that the Labour improvement in November has now slowed coming into December, yet the Tory decline is showing a slight increase. Swing all over the damn place!
463. Tim - if IHT cuts are so unpopular ‘post recession’ why is Darling retaining the half baked married couples £600k IHT cut in the PBR? Labour say one thing and do another.
469.
470 / 472
Take your fingers out of your ears and your heads out the sand.
Thatcherism has bankrupted us.
Signs are that Labour is finally doing what it should have done from 2nd May 1997, and that is to roll back the damaging Thatcherite dogma that preceded Blair’s election then.
No sign at all that the Tories have learned the lesson.
468. Britian controls the EU!!! I’m struggling between whether you are a spoof or a nutter. If we control it, why does most of its legislation shaft us?
468. when are the start and finish dates of your thirty years of thatcherism, sorry, Thatcherite ravaging? 1979-2009 presumably?
482. Actually learn how the EU works before making a fool of yourself again.
473. RN. Quite. Shame he is going to lose his seat.
481. I think you’re looking at the Soviet Union model aren’t you.
re 479 well quite, but to damn a polling organisation just because it produced its data for a betting site rather than a newspaper seems to show somewhat of a lack of statistical awareness.
481 - I think you will find that Labour are in power.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/in_depth/uk_politics/2007/blair_years/default.stm
481. LOL! Lbaour screw up and ruin us and the leftie response is to blame it all on Maggie! Classic!
466 - Your case of an 188 year orphan inheriting a 300k hous may happen, but rarely.
Perhaps given increased life expectancy we need to build in exceptions for young people who lose both their parents, I’ll accept that.
473 - I hope so on every level.
Financially I will benefit hugely, politically and morally too.
490 - 18 year old, not Methuselah
483.
Start - Roughly 1981-2? Hard to pinpoint an exact date. Tracking the sharp spike in unemployment around that time provides a good marker.
End - Lehmanns collapse. 15th Sept 2008.
It seems that the main reason for voting Labour is apparently:
“We’ve been rubbish for 12 years, but we will be better in the future. Promise”
Not sure that sells any better than the toffs attack.
482. I know how the EU works, we pay them lots of money to spend on things like Real Madrid’s training ground and then don’t get to see any audited accounts.
To be called a fool by you my friend is like being called a pervert by Gary Glitter.
No, Ben seriously, are Labour and the Lib Dems really the same thing?
George Osborne: For confidence to return, Britain needs a credible plan
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/comment/6737350/George-Osborne-For-confidence-to-return-Britain-needs-a-credible-plan.html
Why can’t David Cameron seal the deal?
The Tories’ wobble in the polls shows that David Cameron needs to be respected as well as liked, argues Janet Daley.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/comment/columnists/janetdaley/6738204/Why-cant-David-Cameron-seal-the-deal.html
Er
where does one start.
Labour has destroyed more manufacturing jobs than Thatcher.
Labour unleashed unregulated banking which wrecked our banks.
Labour borrowed heavily and spent it on things of little value so that the country cannot recover from the recession.
Labour destroyed Civil Liberties
Labour invaded a foreign country
and in case they might get challenged Blair and Brown just couldn’t get photographed enough with Margaret Thatcher.
As usual Labour cannot hold its hand up to a mess of its own creation.
Interesting how Tim always picks the highest previous poll for the Conservatives to compare with a low poll and then try to spin it as a terrible drop. The spin is getting ever more desperate in the Brown bunker.
497 - Let’s not forget that other Labour achievement, the rise of the BNP.
497 - But it’s OK Alanbrooke, apparently they won’t be so rubbish in the future. BenM says so.
481. Utter cobblers. The economy was doing very nicely whilst Brown stuck to Tory spending plans (Bank regulation being another issue), but after the 2001 election Brown turned the taps on and put the country in a vary precarious position. I have no doubt at all that if Brown had carried on in a similar vein to 1997-2001 (a period when Labour were very popular) that a) we’d be doing a lot better economically now, and b) Labour would have already won their fourth term.
You may want to turn the clock back to 1979, but I doubt even Gordon Brown intends to do that.
471,
Then they should also remove MORI (major recent changes to methodology since Mayoral election = impossible to produce a track record on their current polling, not producing for a newspaper, production of outliers) and arguably ComRes as well (major changes to methodology = impossible to establish a valid track record, producing for the Independent - which shouldn’t really count as a newspaper (it is, I believe, a self-styled “viewspaper”, and also has a readership of 92 people, three cats and a confused gerbil)
345 “Instead he allows more people to be caught by fiscal drag.”
That is is how the Conservatives should rebutt Labour on their dishonest attempts to spin the IHT policy away from one that only the rich pay. Labour have certainly taxed everyone but the rich until the pips squeaked, hell, Gordon turned those stealth taxes on the poorer and middle income earners into an art form. Lots of tax breaks if you were very rich, but sod you if your company had a share scheme or wanted to give you a company car etc.
500
Yes, I’m sure you can trust BenM he souds like a straight kinda guy.
Possibly a lawyer.
502 - The 3 cats and the gerbil don’t read the Independent, they get it for litter box purposes.
498. The mantra repeated by Labour ad nauseam when I was growing up was ‘13 years of Tory misrule’. Now they’ve been in power for 12 years and they’re still blaming everything on the terrible Tories.
507
it will be 13 years next year - plus ca change.
501. Obviously you don’t get it!
Up until May 3rd 1979 Britain was a land of milk and honey and absolutely everything was perfect!!
But then nasty, horrible Thatcher got in and ruined everything!!!
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1233502/Can-documents-Your-Majesty–Queen-faces-anti-terror-checks-time-leaves-UK.html
485. Scott P. You think so?
As well as our bet on whether Darling holds his seat at the next GE, I’ve also got Darling running for me in my next Labour leader portfolio. At odds of 100/1 to a reasonable stake. Hmm…
509. wibbler. That’s e-Bordering on the insane.
509 - Where as Harperson just screams “don’t you know who I am”…
510 - Scott is wrong there.
The Conservatives in Scotland aren’t performing well enough to remove many MPs at all, let alone Darling.
509 - Oh, The Duke of Edinburgh is going to have fun with that when someone asks him those questions.
513. tim. How do you rate Darling’s leadership chances?
508.
‘Cos history’s largest financial crash was a price worth paying for Thatcher to destroy the Unions and hand power instead to an unaccountable, unproductive Banking oligarchy!
Foolish Tories drunk on their own propaganda.
And I love the hilarious arguments in defence of Cam’s self-enriching IHT policy!
A £500K windfall is a £500K windfall. If poor old Prunella has to sell a £500K house to pay a tax charge prior to receiving an unearned 400K inheritance then nearly all British people would see that as a fair deal. Except your average Tory of course!
514
Yes, you just know fate has decreed it will be a non-white customs officer the first time.
431.”I wouldn’t call IHT a Labour obsession, its a political strategy.”
Sorry Ian, its not a strategy but a vendetta. Osborne’s IHT policy paid for by the non doms totally blew the government out of the water in that Conference season of 2007. Combined with Major going public to attack Brown on his visit to Iraq during the Tory conference, it all went toxic for Brown and then he bottled that Autumn GE. That is the key to Labour’s obsession with IHT, and it combines wonderfully with a nice bit of class warfare in their eyes.
We have got a mouthwatering deficit right now, and its still rising. We are still waiting for the PBR, this policy is a drop in the ocean, but you can bet its one of Gordon’s grudge list priorities.
503 - I’m with you there.
As recent studies have shown and Camerons preferred philosopher says, its inequality that matters, and not inequality between countries but within them.
It does make you wonder why Dave wants to cut his tax bill on an 18th century estate though.
516
Prunella Scales backs Labour - why is Brown forcing her to sell her house ?
So Ben you said that one should vote for either the Lib Dems or Labour to secure the glorious future you outlined. Which of the two would you prefer and why?
518 - The issue here Christina is Osborne failing to recognise how public opinion would change in a recession towards a policy tat benefits rich people.
516 - People never seem quite so keen when they are the ones who may have to pay some IHT, and that includes Labour supporters.
That’s why the policy was so popular and why Labour copied it.
520. Part of her scale back?
519 Repeat after me - the rich don’t pay inheritance tax, the unprepared do.
516. Errr I think you’ll find that it was Brown who gave the bankers free reign!
443.”Treasury sources last night brushed off speculation that the chancellor will announce a windfall tax on banks or bank bonuses.”
ScottP, I have almost given up following this briefings. It could be Brown, Mandelson or Balls doing the briefing, but I doubt its Darling. It sounds like the arguing and horse trading will go on right up to the last minute, hence the very mixed messages being fed to the media this week as everyone tries to bounce everyone else into their camps.
..and a new Timbot spinner with BenM.
522 - If you are saying that Osborne hasn’t realised that public opinion would change then I assume you are agreeing that his decision to put the change back due to the recession is because he thinks it is the right thing to do.
526. It never reigns but it poors.
523 ‘People never seem quite so keen when they are the ones who may have to pay some IHT, and that includes Labour supporters.’
And Labour Ministers. Such as the Millibands.
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/uk/article484468.ece
516 - Ben, please tell me you’ve been sterilised?
527. Wouldn’t it be good if just for once you actually got a sense that anybody in this dreadful government actually had an idea about what they are actually doing, re. the economy?
515 - Sadly only about 16/1, but having taken 66/1 I suppose thats a decent bet.
I really, really like Alistair Darling.
Tory friends of mine are glad he was in charge when the banking crisis hit (I doubt you’ll find many people that wished Osborne had been there).
I doubt he’ll become leader, if he did you’d see the Tory party revisiting their 1992 fears big style.
“John Rentoul: Brown is safe, but not home and dry
The Prime Minister had a good week, but the murmuring of leadership challengers is always audible”
http://www.independent.co.uk/opinion/commentators/john-rentoul/john-rentoul-brown-is-safe-but-not-home-and-dry-1835060.html
522.No tim, its about the fact that some very senior people are still very sore about what happened back in 2007. Osborne totally screwed Brown and his inner circle, the months of planning that went up in smoke. Not only did the bunker have a total meltdown with poor wee Dougie Alexander having to take the blame as a minor player, they also managed to do the opposite of what they set out to do, unite the Conservatives behind Cameron and Osborne.
Ouch, that is gotta hurt.
BenM
have you ever thought of moving to Belfast ?
There are many opportunities for young men with no ability for rational thought in Paramilitary organisations. You get gym membership and a wide choice of body art as side benefits.
Failing that Stormont always has vacancies for people who have a distorted view of history, indeed it is a prerequisite for the job.
Note that:
The yawning gap in inequality was begun… under Thatch
Britain’s balance of international trade fell into deficit for the first time since the industrial revolution… under Thatch.
Manufacturing (1 million jobs lost) and highly capital intensive industry (ie. long term growth providers) were decimated… under Thatch.
3 million people were unemployed… under Thatch.
The huge spike in crime and social disorder which peaked under Major was begun… under Thatch.
The quangocracy exploded for the first time… under Thatch.
The Single European Act was signed… by Thatch (I love that one!).
Child poverty was tripled… under Thatch.
The big bang financial deregulation which was the precursor to the credit crunch happened… under Thatch.
516. “‘Cos history’s largest financial crash was a price worth paying for Thatcher to destroy the Unions and hand power instead to an unaccountable, unproductive Banking oligarchy!”
You really are an idiot. Brown is the man who changed UK banking regulation to disastrous effect, and he was warned it would end in tears.
525 - I realise you are saying that Camerons family is involved in a tax avoidance scheme.
I think thats a question he does not want to be asked.
This is ridiculous
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/8393602.stm
537. Oi! We’ve got quite enough space cadets here already!
536 - Yes you are right, some people are. But Osbornes clinging to his IHT policy post recession is playing in the opposite way.
It’s a gift, you know it is.
510. stjohn. I think Darling would make a competent leader of the Labour party, and he is going to lose his seat.
I am not basing that assertion on the national polls.
I am not aware of any Scottish posters who strongly disagree with that.
I noticed this on an earlier thread
I’m not sure if Sighthill has ever been described as lush or affluent Stuart.! In all seriousness I think Edinburgh SW is quite a difficult one. There are some good areas for the Tories but there are also some very strong Labour areas. It’s certainly not as good for us as the old Pentlands seat.
by Max December 5th, 2009 at 11:10 am
It just so happens that residents in Sighthill have been actively campaigning for the Tory candidate! They might see darling on the telly, but they see Jason Rust on their doorstep
538. Small typo ‘m’ should be ‘elton’.
How is Oz?
538 - Ben - Go on, indulge me who would you suggest I vote for Labour or the Lib Dems?
540 - Tim, you’re obviously slightly more partisan than Ben. Give me some positive reasons to vote Labour. You know you want to but I appreciate I’m not really a PB regular poster so am probably not worth the effort.
540.tim, I would love to have the figure for the amount of posts you have made on IHT in the last few months, and those which mention Cameron and Osborne in the same sentence. This is bordering on obsessional to be honest.
C’mon, how many times have you mentioned IHT with a direct link to Cameron on this thread alone?
538. “The big bang financial deregulation which was the precursor to the credit crunch happened… under Thatch.”
Oh FFS big bang was about trading, I don’t think even Brown has blamed that for the current mess. Brown’s tripartite system of banking regulation lead to the RBS/HBOS cluster-fuck.
522 tim
Richard Nabavi has made the most pertinent comment today on your and Labour’s IHT obsession when he said I’d have thought it would be better to concentrate on fending off the “mad refusal to face up to the reality of a £200bn deficit” attack.
The Tory IHT threshold raising proposals are irrelevant in the context of the current economic crisis. Cameron and Osborne have accepted this by making their commitments to change the tax subsidiary and sequential to their debt reduction and economic revival and restructuring plans.
On the subject of capital assets vs income, then I would have some sympathy with a proposal that required residential property transferred to be taxed as income at its rentable value. This principal could be more widely applied to property taxes in general.
If UK PLC was a company - with Brown its CEO and Darling its CFO - an
539. From and idiot to a dupe.
Brown tinkered with the regulatory framework, but didn’t challenge the underlying Thathcerite dogma which dictated that to tighten regulation on Financial Services was a sin graver than any other.
Imagine the wild hysteria from the Tory press had Brown clamped down on Banking excess in 1997!
Always worth understanding the context in which Labour was working in those days. Yep, they should have foreseen the gargantuan risk the banks were likely to end up playing with. But that would have been to invite Tory ire through their press sycophants who’d have screeched about how Labour was turning back the Lady’s, er, “reforms”!
538. “The big bang financial deregulation which was the precursor to the credit crunch happened… under Thatch.”
Oh FFS big bang was about trading, I don’t think even Brown has blamed that for the current mess. Brown’s tripartite system of banking regulation lead to the RBS/HBOS cluster-f*ck.
re 538 No, no, no. Thatcher didn’t go quite that far. I think you’ll find that the Single European Act was signed by HM.
527. ChristinaD. The briefing does appear chaotic. I suppose it could be some kind of attempt to smoke out the mole; if you give different briefing documents to different people and see which one leaks? Of course if they all leak…
548 Ignore last line.
So BenM thinks that Thatcherism started in 1981-2.
Lets say May 1981 two years after her election and let say the Labour economic era begain in May 1999, two years after their election.
May 1981 - May 1999
Industrial production = 44% increase
Unemployment = 845,000 decrease
Public debt = 7.8% decrease
May 1999 - Aug 2009
Industrial production = 14% decrease
Unemployment = 718,000 increase
Public debt = 20.6% increase
Looks like its Blair and Brown who ravaged the British economy.
For those who are betting on seats:
“Labour is to step up its attack on the Conservative Party’s climate change divisions by targeting 31 “green seats” that David Cameron needs to win the election.”
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/labour-to-paint-camerons-target-seats-green-1835029.html
550. “But that would have been to invite Tory ire through their press sycophants who’d have screeched about how Labour was turning back the Lady’s, er, “reforms”!”
Yes the Tories had the press in their pocket in 1997 didn’t they.
Honestly you are worse than Gabble, and that’s saying something.
553 - Go on. Finish it.
538
so then why on your own Labour values has the trend continued instead of reversing.?
Income inequality - the highest ever
The trade deficit just gets bigger every year and was encouraged by the government policies.
Manufacturing industry massacred by Labour with more jobs lost by Brown Blair than Thatcher and manufacturing’s %age of GDP at the lowrst ever recorded
5 million non-active citizens under Labour
Violent crime at its highest
Quangos multiply with massive wage inflation for top CEOs who ara all Labour party placemen
Promised a referendum on Europe by Labour didn’t get one, Thatchers rebate given away at a cost of £ 6 billion in the middle of the worst recession for 50 years
The very poor are getting poorer - child poverty targets all missed despite massive expenditure of public funds. Education failing poor children and trapping them in poverty.
The banking system trashed by Labour and we still have to pay bonuses !
Keep going Ben you are reminding everyone why to avoid Labour !
540 What’s the issue? Tax avoidance is perfectly legal. Even Gordon and Sarah Brown have taken advantage of clever financial schemes to keep hold of their money.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/1556730/Flat-deal-will-mean-tax-savings-for-Brown.html
“In the 31 seats, the Green Party or Scottish Green Party had a 2 per cent or higher share of the vote – which could make the difference between the Tories winning or losing on a marginal swing. The Tories need to win Tooting – target seat number 112 - with a notional Labour majority of 5,190, to win an outright majority. In this south London seat, the Greens won a 4.1 per cent share of the vote in 2005. “
Baroness Ashton, her communist lover and a riddle of Moscow gold
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1233545/Baroness-Ashton-communist-lover-riddle-Moscow-gold.html
552.ScottP, this totally chaotic briefing and counter briefing is a clear sign of the divisions and rows going on behind the scene in Downing Street. Brown wants a political PBR in the run up to the GE, Darling has to give a completely different one if he is to steady nerves and avoid spooking the markets. This is your nightmare on Downing Street scenario.
Test Test Test.
I assume that there is a problem with my comments being seen by other contributors as I haven’t had an answer to the following
538 - Ben - Go on, indulge me who would you suggest I vote for Labour or the Lib Dems?
540 - Tim, you’re obviously slightly more partisan than Ben. Give me some positive reasons to vote Labour. You know you want to but I appreciate I’m not really a PB regular poster so am probably not worth the effort
547 - On many occasions, you are right.
I started in December last year when I started posting here, and it was blindingly obvious to me that this was a huge mistake by the Conservatives and it would be a massive election issue.
Of course the herd disagreed, but as ever the herd were wrong.
As for the direct links to Osborne and Cameron, it has a direct link, that’s why it resonates.
In the wake of the worst financial crisis in 60 years David Camerons tax priority is to cut his and other wealthy family’s tax bill by hundreds of thousands of pounds.
538. “The yawning gap in inequality was begun”
Yeah, it was much better when everyone was equally poor under Labour in the 70s. They called it “the English disease” I believe.
“Britain’s balance of international trade fell into deficit for the first time since the industrial revolution…”
You clearly don’t understand economics. The current account is the flip side of the capital account. This movement happened because huge amounts of investment flooded into Britain thanks to Thatcher’s reforms.
“Manufacturing (1 million jobs lost) and highly capital intensive industry (ie. long term growth providers) were decimated… under Thatch.”
Yes, inefficient manufacturing that had not been viable for years. The shock to the system was horrible because it had been so artificially propped up, rather than the gentle decline it could have been had we just allowed the market to function in the first place.
“The huge spike in crime and social disorder which peaked under Major was begun”
Most social disorder happened because of Scargill and his ilk, who still dreamt of an idiotic socialist paradise.
“The quangocracy exploded for the first time”
Firstly, the quangocracy was nowhere near as bad as it is today. Secondly, most new “quango” type bodies set up under Thatcher were regulators in the new private industries - much better than the bloated socialist “national champions” that drained the public purse.
“The Single European Act was signed”
A reasonable extension of the single market and a victory for free trade, with no real political integration. This is nothing on ending the UK’s status as a sovereign state, as Brown has allowed. She also managed to make sure Britain paid a reasonable amount, back before Blair gave away for… oh yes, CAP reform that never happened. Who just got the new agricultural post? A pro-French statist. Blair was as outmanouvered as Brown.
“Child poverty was tripled.”
Only in the sense of poverty relative to the average income, and this was mainly the result of the average income surging as people got wealthier.
“The big bang financial deregulation which was the precursor to the credit crunch happened.”
Looks like you understand finance as well as you understand economics. How precisely did the end of the division between jobbers and brokers lead to the credit crunch?
431 Ian Bailey
You are one of the more thoughtful left of centre posters but I would ask you to read your post again carefully and objectively:
I wouldn’t call IHT a Labour obsession, its a political strategy. A component of the argument that the Tories will give tax cuts to the rich and make the rest of us pay the bill. Is it working? Well, are the Tories being forced to defend it and thus re-emphasise the point over and over again?
I think some Tory posters have forgotten how politics work. Facts don’t matter, individual issues rarely become make or break, the key is generally gut feel - what do voters feel deep down? Tell most people that the people who have to pay the bill for the banking fiasco isn’t the bankers - who get tax cuts - but them, and for some reason they don’t think that very fair.
Whilst a lot of what you say is valid explanation of the current state of politics, it also depicts a “Thick of It” moral corruption which is destroying politics and political communication. Your post sets out more clearly than any argument on policies or political theories why this Labour government must be removed from office at the General Election. And until Labour realises why the political world described in you post is so corrupting, they should not be allowed by the electorate to return to power
Oncoming Storm
SORRY - we’d better sort him out over here. Though I have the suspicion someone this dumb can only be the bastard child of Willie McCrea and Catriona Ruane.
This has reached the the level where I seriously doubt he could spell IQ let alone possess one. Still good craic all round.
Off to bed now
Night All.
561. Succouring Britain’s enemies a generation ago, working against Britain’s interests today. Very appropriate.
564 tim, following your logic, it must be correct to assume that Darlings *Actual* changes to IHT were deliberately targetted to benefit his family and friends, and those of other members of the government.
Shorter 566.
Nyah, nyah! My fingers are in my ears and I can’t hear you!
Otherwise, a risible attempt to debunk my devastating points.
570. Well Darling does have 5 houses; plenty to pass on to the kids…
562. I am still awaiting the results of Tim’s investigation into Baroness Ashton’s links with the enemies of this country. He must be finding so much evidence if it is taking all this time when he can respond so quickly on other matters.
571 BenM, is tim your pimp?
Going further up the thread and Ben says even more ridiculous thing. The EU is a helpline in the crisis? Tell that to Greece, Ireland and Spain that desperately need loose monetary policy but as the ECB announced the other day it will be going in the opposite direction.
As for Britain controlling the EU! What did Sarkozy say the other day? Oh yes, it was “The British are the real losers”, after Sarkozy managed to get a Frenchman to hammer a major sector of Britain’s economy, while getting an ally in agriculture to continue the propping of a major sector of France’s…
571 - “my devastating points”
Aah, so you are on a wind up.
575. BenM did not say Britain controls the EU, he said “we”, which I can only assume means “the political elite”.
571. I see you’ve stopped trying to make arguments on their merits when someone actually debunks them - always a sign of someone losing a debate.
The Sage of Twickenham speaks (rather writes)
Banks must help clean up the red ink
By VINCE CABLE
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/debate/article-1233478/VINCE-CABLE-Banks-help-clean-red-ink.html
574 - You could say that about any tax if you wanted to. Gordon Brown raised taxes on the poor to give himself and his friends a tax cut with the 10p tax rate.
tag-team-tim you are up late.
Have you contacted the organ grinder in chief yet so you can answer my question? You know, the one with the red rag around his neck, not the one in the bunker.
You haven’t forgotten what it is, have you? Or has the duty tim changed again?
Anyway, here is a reminder, and please note whose opinion is being sought. Ready? Here it is:
Why does Gordon Brown want IHT for the many rather than only for the rich few?
Don’t forget now, will you?
564 tim
But it isn’t a “tax priority”. It has been made a political priority by Labour not the Tories [I'm talking 2009 here not 2007].
Had Labour not focussed on the Tories IHT plans, they probably would have been dropped quietly by Cameron as a first term commitment. Instead it has been turned into a political virility test.
Of course Labour will gain some traction by targetting IHT and associating it - wittily or otherwise - with Dave and George’s mates, but such gains will be short term and pyrrhic. The election will not be won by core Labour or Conservative voters: those that have the power to grant victory will make their decision on the credibility of each party’s plans to stabilise and revive the wider economy. Banging on about IHT is taking the eye off the ball and will be seen by these voters as frivolous and vexatious.
Cameron will win the next election. Labour’s attacks on his IHT proposals have ensured that they will be implemented by the end of Cameron’s first term.
An own goal?
Resurgent Brown ready to declare class war on Tories
Alistair Darling’s pre-budget report this week will fire the first salvos in a six-month election campaign
http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2009/dec/06/brown-cameron-general-election-campaign
454.ScottP, that is a really interesting article in the Telegraph, but its this bit which sticks out for me rather than all the hints at a positive message and some goodies in the PBR.
“The Chancellor knows that the public don’t vote on what you have achieved. They vote on what you promise.”
Frank Luntz asked a very important question when he was on This Week on Thursday night, ‘will the voters give Labour 18 years in office on the back of their record in the last three years. And and promises Darling makes have to not only resonate, the have to be credible to the public. If I was him, I would play this PBR with a very straight bat after the fall out from Brown’s last budget as Chancellor. If he doesn’t, its not just his own credibility that will toast, this government is gone.
Obsessing on class is madness when we search for leadership
Those sneering about background in parliament should take care. As a nation we’ve always been more interested in character
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2009/dec/06/henry-porter-class-debate
Andrew Rawnsley has an interesting take
The Tories have put all their chips on David Cameron
He’s been a talented leader of the opposition but the Conservative party’s one-man-band approach is beginning to look risky
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2009/dec/06/gordon-brown-david-cameron
567 - Seth - Given that you want the Conservatives to win the next election, and think that they will.
Why, in a period of economic constraint is it a wise move for Osborne to cling to the IHT pledge?
570 - As ever Ed you live down to your position at the back of the herd.
please stick to the films.
Perhaps this is a good time to do a league table.
European Places, as ever David “the herdsman” Herdson, Coxall Nabavi and Fear (there’s a film title there) Coxall and Nabavi becoming the Man U and Chelsea.
Casino Royale, SeanT and Seth O Logue, threat to the big four.
Seth needs to learn about betting, Casino has stopped obsessing about Europe and has improved.
SeanT’s insight on Europe is impressive, he’s growing up.
Mid Table.
SallyC, ChristinaD Wethercock.Madasafish.
Everton, really what more is there to say.
Just above relegation places.
Slackbladder, Simon St Clare et al - West Ham.Not worth the subscription (sorry Patrick)
Relegation.
MTF,EdP and now Oracle and PLato.
Three places, four scrapping over the descent.
587 - I’m hurt, that I’m not even in the Premier League of the herd.
588. It also looks like I’ll have to be happy with the odd cup run.
589 - Perhaps we are the Barcelona and Real Madrid of the herd?
Why won’t they answer me. Is it because I work for the NHS and they assume that I’m going to vote for them anyway?
“538 - Ben - Go on, indulge me who would you suggest I vote for Labour or the Lib Dems?
540 - Tim, you’re obviously slightly more partisan than Ben. Give me some positive reasons to vote Labour. You know you want to but I appreciate I’m not really a PB regular poster so am probably not worth the effort.”
588 - You know, as soon as I pressed submit, I thought that.
you are in the group trying to break into the big four.
Clearly in no danger of relegation, above mid table but tempted into the Smithson “avoid IHT betting scam”
587 TIMBOT, judging from your response at 587 I see I’ve hit a nerve with the post at 570.
‘Casino has stopped obsessing about Europe’
And what do we have there? The Great Obsessor himself, chastising another poster for indulging in his own favourite pastime.
I think we should ask tim to conduct the IgPB.com alternative award ceremonies.
Herdsman of the year?
565.”As for the direct links to Osborne and Cameron, it has a direct link, that’s why it resonates.”
No, the only link is the fact that Cameron and Osborne screwed the whole Brown premiership on the back of a policy that is basically a drop in the ocean with our current economic problems. Its that personal to some in Downing Street, the whole edifice loving built up over many years crumbled over that Conference season. Cameron and Osborne were meant to bottle it not Brown and his team, that wasn’t in the script.
Every time you go on about this one single policy on these threads, and then link to Cameron and Osborne. I think IHT=Cameron+Osborne=Bottled GE=Tory polling lead=Conservative GE victory. It all started to go wrong when Osborne stood up that day and delivered that speech, oh the headlines that night. And poor Gordon, his big announcement of troops home for Christmas in Iraq had unraveled just as fast as his 2p off income tax announcement did.
Tory toffs is the other failed strategy that continues to feed of that theme as well. Blair told Brown it was mistake before he left office, but Brown needs to prove that both the class war and that Tory IHT policy is a vote loser even now. Its all a bit sad really.
Why won’t they respond? Is it because they know I’m NHS payroll and will vote for them anyway?
“538 - Ben - Go on, indulge me who would you suggest I vote for Labour or the Lib Dems?
540 - Tim, you’re obviously slightly more partisan than Ben. Give me some positive reasons to vote Labour. You know you want to but I appreciate I’m not really a PB regular poster so am probably not worth the effort.”
587 - I happily take it as a compliment that I’m not considered premier league material by Tim of all people!! A Conference rating by him will do for me!
590. More likely Chicago Fire for me…
Can I be Burnley? I’m going down hill pretty quickly.
591 - So I’ve gone from thinking i’m Barcelona to find out I’m actually Aston Villa? That’s a bit of a blow to the old ego (Apologies to StJohn, Villa are an amazing team and they’ve wone the European Cup more times than Chelsea)
I’d love to see Roger’s premier league of the herd.
598 - Posts like that will see the end of your posting privileges.
587 How sad TIMBOT. Is your life so shallow and empty that you measure your standing, and that of others in the world by means of a league table of arbitrary ratings of website postings?
TSE Rawnsley has mangled that theme before.
It is tripe for two reasons. Cameron is not the only talent in the Tory party. Thiise who stood for leader are still around and there are some great young talents coming through the second rank of shadow ministers.
Secondly, there is no sign that he is a liability and no reason to expect that will change.
The article is psychological displacement - straw clutching if you prefer - because itis true in the Labour party. What talent is there to replace Brown? Mandleson, Milliband, Johnson or most wonderful of all Harperson. All Labour’s eggs are in the Brown basket now.
Meanwhile simmering discontent and plotting move around the bunker like flies round a butcher’s shop.
I know which leader I would put faith in as an egg carrier.
602 - I know, the first comment to that article is the most perceptive
“The Tories have put all their chips on David Cameron
And New Labour have put all thiers on Gordon Brown.
Nice try Rawnsley. Dream on.”
593 - Wibbler and Antifrank of course are Rangers and Celtic.
Big clubs but unsure where they belong.
tag-team-tim duty bot: phone home and get an answer to my question, slacker.
604 - What’s your self assessment then tim? Accrington Stanley?
606 - No he is more a your Levadia, champions of Estonia pretty much every year. Have to understand, not a lot of competition in the league, big fish in a small pond and all that. However as soon as they get up against the big boys made too look fools and complete amateurs.
e.g most recently losing 0–5 against Galatasaray in the UEFA Europa League.
lol - I go off to play p*ker for a while, pop in to see if anything major happened and see timbot still fighting the fight for labour.
Even though he claims to be on voter strike
Try to get some sleep tim, 20 hour days just not good for you
Especially when your team are really rather pants and heading for a defeat
There should be “no sacred cows” when it comes to making spending cuts in the pre-Budget report, a national business body has warned.
In its latest economic assessment, the British Chambers of Commerce (BCC) said reform of the public sector must be the “cornerstone of a credible plan”.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/business/8397517.stm
Pressure on Gordo….I think they mean they want CUTS.
Pressure on Gordo….I think they mean they want CUTS, no ifs no buts.
608 - Tag Team Tim has done better this evening, than last, where he made a complete and utter tit of himself. 12hrs bashing a photo of Cameron, only for it be revealed that his “strange wrist position” was due to it being a PR photo for a very worthy Services charity wristband.
611 - That was funny.
I have been trying to think of some suitable covers to celebrate the reforming of the New Labour tribute, although without their former lead singer. God, I bet they wish they could emulate Take That without Robbie.
Do you mean this one?
http://img.thesun.co.uk/multimedia/archive/00942/SNN0512A-682_942497a.jpg
To be fair even Nick Palmer MP had a go at Dave’s pic.
613.That should of course be tribute band, spotted the mistake just after I pressed submit.
613 - Relight My Fire?
So much of the mood at the moment and the media narrative is being driven by the polls and this might just calm some of the jitters in the Tory camp
errrrrrrrrrrrr? I wondered if with Ipsos MORI 6% was a lead of the narrative, or was in fact a follower. There was a huge effort being put into the Hung Parliament narrative before any poll in support saw the light of day.
The event that started the HP narrative was the signing of Lisbon, and the new EU policy statement. It also seemed to follow on the heels of the Labour byelection victory, as a kind of attempt to build momentum.
The HP Narrative started with Hezza on BBC Hard Talk and was then part of a Ken Clarke interview.
It sounded so odd to begin with as there was no polling evidence. I wrote that there was a Narrative in need of a poll here, but then it went mainstream with the Ipsos MORI perfectly timed one at 6%.
If the Tory Lisbon crisis ushered in the HPN, it was the humiliation of the French takeover of The City (pursuant to Lisbon) which has since pushed it out again. Anger at Cameron has now been safely redirected at Sarkozy and the EU.
The Tories are back in business!
617.That one made me laugh out loud. Very good!
D:ream - Things can only get better
Wombats - Lets dance to Joy Division
Talking Heads - Burning down the House
ABBA - Knowing me Knowing you
This may be ‘ONLY!’ a 13% lead, but it actually represents nearly 50% more votes for the Conservative Party then the Labour Party. This is a mountain sized differential in relative support. As good as twice as many voters intend to vote Conservative, then Labour. Or put another way, the opposition Party are twice as popular as the governing party in spite of spouting almost exactly the same handed down establishment BS.
Therefore if Cameron and his party are said to be unpopular with the electorate, WHICH THEY MOST SURLY ARE, what does that say about the popularity of Brown and his lot? Especially as possibly a majority of Labour voters TOTALLY rely on the welfare state to keep them, and their families from literally starving to death.
Words such as hated, despised, and wholly distrusted come to mind.
However it is actually far worse for The British Labour Party than it may at first appear. An expected radical reversal in tactical voting, presents the very real possibility of a meltdown in the number of Labour Party MP’s. Very possibly to far less the 150.
Cameron has a very real advantage, in that public expectations are now so very low, while memories are not sufficiently short. Therefore it could very well take half a lifetime at least for Labour to regain power.
However to quote the words of one of the most dishonestly nasty politicians ever to darken the darkest corridors of The Palace of Westminster.
“SO WHAT”
What may likely turn out to be terminal for the British Labour Party and movement is not at all bad for COMMUNISM and indeed CORPORATE SOCIALISM in general. Why should MARXIST socialists especially care one way or another? Brown has now DONE HIS JOB for his masters.
This country and Europe is now effectively run by a council of unelected and therefore completely unaccountable ministers in Belgium. Who are in turn ruled absolutely by several small, and highly murderously INSANE elite organisations, namely The Club of Rome, The Bilderberg Group, The CFR, and last but not at all least, The RIIA. Who are in turn controlled by the owners and controllers of the International Banking System. Who are also controlled by something so unspeakable, that it is best for my wife and kids, that not even myself speak about it. Please try your best to at least accept that the following is at least partially if not wholly the TRUTH regarding our common situation.
In my most honest, well informed and earnest opinion.
An elite aristocratically related group comprising of Saddam Hussain, Edward 1st, Queen Victoria, Pol-Pot, Adolf Hitler, Joe Stalin, and Vlad the Impaler would have nothing on this particular bunch of blood sucking imperialist corporatist psychopaths. These people have ways of making things happen, shall we say, that would make any previous group of insanely criminal despots, green with envy. Ways, means, and just as importantly MOTIVES for making Nagasaki and Hiroshima look like a summer barbecue party that got slightly out of control. Or more likely the Black Death look like a bad case of endemic acne.
‘EVENTS’ have the potential to change EVERYTHING. Therefore he or they that have always secretly or otherwise controlled national and more especially WORLD ‘EVENTS,’ do in reality effectively control the everyday lives, deaths, and thinking of EVERYBODY ELSE.
For Gordon’s running of the economy I’d like to nominate,
Shaggy - It Wasn’t Me
618. I’d have thought the Tories would be relieved rather than pleased tonight. It could have been a lot worse for them, but these polls nevertheless confirm that the Tory lead has slipped from where it was fairly recently.
621.GizmoDuck, another brilliant choice, mine seem as jaded as this government in comparison. Love the name by the way.
621.Gizmo, Relight my fire and It wasn’t me are keepers. What else?
622 - You’re right. I think there was a Lisbon blip for our boy Dave, but I expect the tory numbers to improve now that the Labour party has gone batsh1t crazy on class warfare.
And for the SNP, I nominate Take That’s ‘Never forget’ in honour of them harking back to the anti Thatcher theme.
623 - Thanx. The cheap wine seems to be working on my brain.
622 - As somebody who has never voted Tory, but clearly hates the current mob, I think these kind of polls are very good news.
I don’t want the Tories thinking they are going to walk it, they need to have to work and prove themselves ready to govern, or at least show they are better than the current shower of s##t.
At the moment, they have fleshed some policy areas out e.g education. But lots of areas are still quite empty. Polls of this size mean they are going to definitely be forced to flesh out a lot more before the GE.
Blair got in far too easily, a lot of it being not Major and promising the land of milk and honey. Little scrutiny is a very bad thing.
625.Nah, there is a bit of hysteria over Lisbon and a lingering anger over expenses. Its Christmas and the polling goes a bit loopy during this period, also check out the difference between weekend and weekday polling, that is another factor that backs that up.
Its going to come down to the GE campaign and wall to wall politics in the media. Also watch what happens if the electorate see this as a closer race with a hung Parliament a real possibility. That will focus minds.
I was the birthday girl until midnight, so I got the good stuff!
Just had the best lamb tikka that I have ever tasted, cooked by the other half and the kids.
I think there was definatly a Lisbon blip, but it has gone away as people realised that a referendum now would be pointless.
630 – Err, belated happy Birthday Christina..?
I’ve got weekend guest, any suggestions for a subtle way of getting them off to bed? Its after 2am fgs.
527. For the love of God, why doesnt the PM just get a bulldozer and clear the square mile? I am sure the French will lend him a couple if he is unable to find one.
632 - Put the snooker on TV?
632.Thanks, just be honest and say your are knackered and need your bed. Oh, start falling asleep in your chair first.
632 - Print off TimBot posts and invite them to read them?
#626 ChristinaD
I keep saying this in the hope that one day you will realise that the Tories are less popular in Scotland NOW than they ever were under Thatcher.
As for your earlier comments about the SNP believing that that the GE in Scotland is a Labour/SNP battle, it is blindingly obvious that is correct. The electorate clearly recognises that, and the Tories will not get more seats or votes in Scotland than the SNP.
Although I think the Tories will have more than 1 seat in Scotland after the GE, just wait and see how the polls move when there is a Tory Government again in the UK. After a very brief Tory honeymoon, there will be a massive swing to the SNP.
634/635 – Unfortunately they are here till Sunday night, I’ve left them in the kitchen making chess on toast…I’ll just sneak off and leave them to it.
638 - Can’t you politely tell them to p1ss off?
637. You’re right, Tom, the Tories’ underperformance in Scotland at the moment is truly extraordinary. They’re on 15% in the latest Mori poll - that’s 2% less than they got in 1997! Incidentally, Mori actually overestimated the Scottish Tory vote in 2005. Other polls have been better for them, but only a little.
I can’t even think of an obvious explanation for it, as there’s nothing like the overt anti-Tory mood there was back in ‘97. It may well be, as you say, that the Tories are seen as increasingly irrelevant in the Scottish political battle, even when that battle is for Westminster seats.
637.”As for your earlier comments about the SNP believing that that the GE in Scotland is a Labour/SNP battle, it is blindingly obvious that is correct.”
No, that is Holyrood, this is a Westminster GE which is a completely different beast. You need to make your selves relevant in this GE, I have no problem with that, that is politics as they say. But, don’t give me a hard time for simple pointing out what has quite clearly become the latest strategy from the SNP after the ‘hung by a Scottish rope’ debacle. God, I bet those Mori and ComRes polls gave Salmond a real shudder, be honest. The Tories only have 1 MP, and you have at present a 7 MP’s. We are both behind the Libdems and Labour in the Westminster seats in Scotland in 2005.
Its going to get quite heated between now and the GE, but be honest, your party does worry about losing out to the Tories in a Westminster GE where its the Tories that are the vehicle that will boot out this Labour government. You know that you benefited from a similar swing in those seats in the Holyrood elections for the same reason.
Belated birthday Greetngs Christna
The beeb have mentionedthe 2 new polls.. I’m gobsmacked.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/8397650.stm
640.LOL, as I said on the earlier thread, that Mori poll was like a premier stash of nuts for a hibernating squirrel.
In 2005, the Libdems did very well in Scotland due to Blair, Iraq and Michael Howard, so no surprises there. This is going to be 2010, and its Brown vs Cameron with the economy totally screwed, want a wee bet that this Mori poll will underestimate the Tory vote in Scotland?
Is Gordo a plus in Scotland? As in, He may be the worst PM ever but he’s Scottish so yay!
641. “Its going to get quite heated between now and the GE, but be honest, your party does worry about losing out to the Tories in a Westminster GE where its the Tories that are the vehicle that will boot out this Labour government.”
I think the honest answer is that’s something we’d worry about in theory, but in practice there just isn’t the slightest scrap of evidence that it’s actually happening. Only five months to go and the Scottish Tories are absolutely nowhere.
It’s startling, in some ways it’s baffling, but that’s where we are.
642 - apologies for spelling, back on this dreadful laptop..
Belated Birthday Greetings Christina
and a happy birthday from me Christina! Hope you had a good one.
643. God, if you only dare to offer bets on the Tories breaking 15% in Scotland then things really are as dire as they seem! Is this an early sign that you’ll be trying to spin even 16% of the vote as some kind of triumph? Let me just remind you yet again - the Tories got 17% of the vote when they were completely wiped out in 1997.
But I’m gratified that you’ve at least swapped the ‘angry wasps’ analogy for my own ’stubborn squirrels’.
Quick question as I really must be off to my bed…
What level of anti-Labour mood is there in Scotland? We’ve some evidence that it does and does not exist in Glasgow with the two by-elections. We’ve also had one by-election outside where Labour did much better than expected. And what are the chances that the best-placed party to challenge Labour will hoover up the non-Labour vote? I ask - and of course this is anecdotal - because I have family in Scotland. From talking to them they loathe Labour and will vote SNP only because that is the best chance of getting rid of their Labour MP in their constituency. Ironically, will both the SNP and Scottish Tories pursue the same voting strategy?
Thanks Kristin & GizmoDuck. I will be honest, its a bit of bu**er really, 44, there goes the early I am in my early 40’s spin.
644.Gordon is a plus in Scotland in their heartlands, but not anywhere else. I predict that Labour will be wiped out everywhere else. Go and check the number of seats in the Glasgow patch, welcome to stick a red rosette on a donkey territory. There are similar places in England and Wales, but just not so concentrated.
645.James, go tell it to the Marines. Its one poll, and after the recent wobbly the SNP have you are mighty relieved. You are like a thirsty man in desert who has found an Oasis in the middle of no where. Just look at Glasgow North East, you were closer to the Tories than Labour there.
I am quite worried about what is going on the Scottish blogsphere right now. If this is a sign of the campaign to come, I don’t want to see it.
648.So that is a no to my offer of a wee bet then, the way you are going on about this Mori poll, the GE result is cast in stone on the back off it?
649. Glenrothes was a weird by-election, Labour spun a kind of black magic that incredibly allowed them to turn it into a referendum on the SNP/Lib Dem local council’s changes to home care charges. Glasgow NE is of course as rock-solid a Labour seat as you can get (as the breakdown of the Euro results show) and Labour fought a very shrewd Old Labour campaign, with the candidate actually criticising the government on a number of points, notably the postal strike. Also they posed as “Glasgow Nationalists” in opposition to the SNP government’s policy on the rail link to Glasgow airport, which was all very well in the context of that by-election, but may backfire elsewhere.
So I think there is still a strong anti-Labour mood in Scotland, but those are the main reasons it didn’t show up in those two particular by-elections. There was a local by-election in Falkirk a week after Glasgow NE that showed a very significant swing from Labour to the SNP.
649.St London Nick, very important question in Scotland where the pollsters regard us as one region. Where is this constituency?
I know at least two Tories who are going SNP at the GE because its a Labour heartland seat and they think the SNP are the nearest rivals.
Don’t just look at the area, look at the industries which fuel the local economy there too. Would they go SNP in some of the seats up my way, absolute not.
On the off chance that this comment gets through, Christina, STOP MAKING THINGS UP TO TRY AND ‘PROVE’ THE VARIOUS BORING, UNLETTERED POINTS YOU TRY AND MAKE!!!!
It’s pathetic. It’s transparent. It’s Tory.
Give it up.
Happy belated birthday ChristinaD
650. “James, go tell it to the Marines.”
Oooh, cranky. Perhaps by posting here I just have told it to the Marines - judging by his politics and general demeanour, I’ve always had my suspicions about Stars & Stripes.
648. That was an utterly ludicrous offer of a bet, Christina, and you know it. I’ll be extremely generous and offer you the same bet based on an 18.5% figure. I’m sure you know that would be an utterly appalling result for an incoming government, so if you refuse it I think that will speak volumes about where you think your party is at just now.
The Tories are back in business!
by Tapestry December 6th, 2009 at 1:58 am
Yes Cameron is back in business, while business, especially the over borrowed variety, is going down quicker then a bankrupt crack whore on speed.
No one would like to believe that the fortunes of Cameron and his Party, and the ultimate fortunes of the British and European People in general were somehow related, more then myself. However my experience and knowledge unwillingly force me to believe otherwise. For reasons I have explained above.
However it is an ill wind indeed that blows no one any good.
I do expect some good things to follow from a Cameron victory, simply because that is how certain things such as democracy are made to work. Always remembering that world changing EVENTS have never been controlled, or enacted by any one who has been elected, or has ever been electable. Do you seriously believe that the powers that have always been, would ever have allowed things to have been any other way?
Are you and others seriously expecting INTELLIGENT, and properly educated people to believe that The Ruling Class would ever have trusted the likes of Brown, Bush, Obama, never mind something as stupidly inane as the great unwashed, to determine the future of THEIR PLANET?
Brown can’t even spell simple words. My 101 year old grandmother knows more about the worlds financial system and classical economics then the whole of the cabinet, and shadow cabinet put together. While possessing no qualifications whatsoever, and leaving school shoeless, at 13 years of age.
Even my five year old knows you don’t borrow more money, when you have clearly borrowed to much already. I am still suffering from mild dyslexia, yet even I knew a 10 that the word comfort does not have a U in it.
Brown, Blair, Obama, Cameron and all the rest are just unwitting or otherwise puppet tools of the establishment, with as much say over the running of REAL government as BBC tea ladies do the BBC. Come to think about it they do have almost as much control over the supremely evil motives of the REAL bosses of The BBC, as does the BBC’s Director General himself. Which I would like to believe go’s without saying time, and time again, is virtually NONE whatsoever.
A.Crowley still has infinitely more influence over the BBC then does the current DG, and he has been apparently dead for over 60 years.
654.wibbler, thanks. I had a lovely day, and I was chased out of the kitchen and told to go and check PB.com for any Sunday polls with a glass of my favourite wine. What more could a girl ask for?
655.James, moving the goal posts, nice try. I offered you a bet on the back of that Mori polling figure for the Tories, the one where you pontificated about how dire the picture was for the Tories. You have declined it.
Cameron response to Brown class war attack is now:
- lead story on BBC website
- 2nd story on Radio 5 news
If this becomes the media lead story on Sunday it could well be a very good day for Cameron.
657. In pint of fact - as anyone can see - we’ve both declined unsolicited offers of bets, Christina. It was a “nice try” on both our parts and the conclusion of everyone looking on will be obvious - we both think the most likely outcome of the GE in Scotland is that the Tories will get 15-18.5% of the vote.
So that, ladies and gentlemen, represents the true prospects for the Scottish Tory party, which let’s remember received 24% of the vote at the nadir of Margaret Thatcher’s unpopularity in 1987 - at the time an all-time low. Truly extraordinary.
658 - Brown balls it up again. Blair would never of done this.
#641 ChristinaD
“No, that is Holyrood, this is a Westminster GE which is a completely different beast. You need to make your selves relevant in this GE, I have no problem with that, that is politics as they say.”
So you say-but the Scottish electorate do not agree with you that the SNP are irrelevant.
If the SNP are truly irrelevant why is it they are going to get more votes and more seats than the Tories?. I don’t think you will offer to bet against that-nor would I expect you to.
659.James, I remember the time we arrived back from a weekend away to find a leaking cistern we were totally unaware of which had finally seeped through the floor to our sitting room. Sometimes, debating with you is like trying to stick the wall paper back on the walls after that.
You made a big point of that Mori poll, you went even further by pointing out that they over estimated the Tory in 2005. I didn’t, it was a bit of an open goal though, I could have just have easily asked you to bet on that SNP figure in that poll being replicated in the GE too.
I remain convinced that Lisbon is the primary driver of any poll drive for the Conservatives. The question is, will the anger remain as we get closes to a General Election? Many members are furious, but with time the fury is settling (for some) and although they remain aggrieved I suspect they will still vote Tory when the time comes. Brown, after all, is the one that must be removed at all costs. Most of the country is united on that.
663 - I think there was a Lisbon poll hit, but it has arleady started to fade. Brown delcaring all out class war will make it recover quite quickly I think.
661.I made a valid point about the SNP making themselves relevant in this GE, and I don’t blame them, that is sound politics. At the last GE, the Libdems were regarded as being more relevant than the SNP or the Tories. You currently have 7 seats at Westminster, six more than the Tories when most people expected Labour to hang on, think about it.
662. Other posters will note that you haven’t repudiated my suspicion that your refusal of my bet indicates that you think the balance of probability is that the Tories will receive less than 18.5%
Christina, there are quite a few things I could compare debating with you to, but discretion is the better part of valour and all that. Let me put this to you. You’ve expressed high admiration for Marcia in the past. Yes, correct? Well, I think it might be relevant to point out at this stage that Marcia left a comment on my blog a few hours ago, pointing out that Mori actually underestimated the SNP in 2005. She wasn’t predicting that the same would happen this time round (it would be incredible if it did, it would mean the SNP on 35%+), it was an observation and a very interesting one. My observation about the Tories was near identical to Marcia’s both in content and phrasing -
http://scotgoespop.blogspot.com/2009/12/ipsos-mori-sensation-snp-lead-labour-in.html
So you’re complaining that I refused to accept a bet on a claim I never explicitly made. Well, in that case, how about a bet on claims that you explicitly have made here? For instance, how about an evens bet on your oft-stated claim that Gordon Brown will not fight the election as Labour leader?
663.Sorry Steve, its not Lisbon, its expenses. Such is the Tory beast UK wide. Go back and check the threads here during the height of the Telegraph expose on expenses, Lisbon simple doesn’t compare. The Tories on here were spitting teeth, and at their own MP’s more than anyone else. I bet if any Tory canvassers are honest, that is the bigger issue on the doorstep, but come GE day, its Brown for another five years if they don’t vote.
666.Sorry, I am off. Don’t bring Marcia into this, she is one of my favourite posters on here, she is an asset to the SNP.
James, I have three teenagers, and your tactics are simple water off a ducks back.
Nite all.
663. Steve, things are already moving on. The French takeover of The City, the Buckingham ego parade, and The Carswell Bill. The anger now is not with Cameron, with Sarkozy.
The Hung Parliament Narrative (HPN1) has gone boring already, as clearly no one really believed in it. Maybe there’ll be a relaunch (HPN2) but there’s no sign as yet.
Next up will the The Carswell Test. Robert Smithson might get his winnings if UKIP fail it.
668. One word, Christina - rattled. I have enough faith in people (if there any non-partisan lurkers around) to know that they’ll see through you in an instant. Refusing to engage with telling points, refusing to even acknowledge a perfectly reasonable offer of a bet on a firm prediction you have repeatedly made when you sanctimoniously criticised me for turning down an unsolicited offer of a bet from you, and instead resorting to your trademark patronising bluster, says it all.
Your holier-than-thou point about Marcia is beneath contempt - I merely accurately related her highly relevant comment from earlier this evening, which is there as a matter of public record, which is why I posted a link. Marcia is indeed an asset to the SNP, a party she is a member of. You, I believe, are a member of the Conservative party - a party which could urgently do with an asset of its own on this site.
Nighty-night.
670. James, how does one become a Conservative asset?
Clearly I am a liability.
There are a few others I’ve noticed who are not classified as assets, but whose comments reveal an unspoken loyalty to the unspeakable party. The words Conservative or Tory spoken with a Scots accent, always sound like some terrible smelly object the dog has dragged in.
But a UKIPPER must smell a little more, the name would suggest, especially if nailed to the back of the wardrobe.
I don’t know of any politics which has the smell of spring, when I think about it. We only seek the least bad solution. There are few assets, just the lesser the liabilities. Fair?
671. To be fair to myself, Tapestry - and I can say this with hand on heart - I intended to say ‘you are a member of the Scottish Conservative party’, and I didn’t notice my mistake until after I pressed submit. The Tories south of the border do have plenty of assets on this site, such as the old-world gentlemanly charm of Seth. Perhaps I was even being a touch harsh on Scottish Tory posters - after all, there’s Easterross. He’s a bit bold in some of his predictions (some would say rash), and some of his views seem a touch eccentric to my leftie eyes, but at least he calls it as he sees it.
James, it’s all a matter of opinion. AFAIC Christina is an asset to the site, however I notice that almost nightly you seem to cross swords with her regardless of what she has to say. I am sure her local Conservative association feel lucky to have her. BTW have you ever disagreed with any other SNP poster on here? If you have I haven’t seen it. They must be all assets in your eyes then. Well pardon me if I disagree.
Personally I enjoy reading posts from just about all sides of the political spectrum, and it’s no secret that I am a Conservative living in Scotland. Then again I am not tribal, I have friends who vote both Labour and SNP. LOL I even voted SNP tactically and may do so again. Mostly I scroll over posts that get personal, however Christina has been very kind to me during what has been a difficult year for me, she’s ‘finest kind’.
ps new blummin thread. After all that typing.
673. See next thread for my response.
Can any one tell how these polls worked out if you remove Scotland from them. I think we all agree the Tory party at best will win only 5 seats in Scotland, so the election will be won or lost in England. So what is the % of the votes in England or England and Wales.
nu labour stayed in power by giving our money away in spades.they have run out and bankrupted the country.
this really was a phoney war.